Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data 

Airpower and ground armies : essays on the evolution of Anglo-American air doctrine. 1940-

1943/ editor, Daniel R Mortensen. 

p. cm. 

Includes bibliographical references and index. 

Air power-Great Britain-History. 2. Air power-United States-History. 3. World War, 1939-1945-

Aerial operations, British, 4. World War, 1939-1945-Aerial operations, American. 5. World War, 

1939-1945-Campaigns-Africa, North. 6. Operation Torch. I. Mortensen, Daniel R. 

UG635.G7A89 1998 

 358.4’03-dc21 97-46744 

 CIP 

Digitize December 2002 from 1998 Printing NOTE: Pagination changed 

Disclaimer 

Opinions, conclusions, and recommendations expressed or implied within are solely those of the 

authors and do not necessarily represent the views of Air University, the United States Air Force, 

the Department of Defense, or any other US government agency. Cleared for public release: 

distribution unlimited. 
Table of Contents 

Page 

DISCLAIMER..................................................................................................................... i 

FORWARD........................................................................................................................ iii 

ABOUT THE EDITOR .......................................................................................................v 

INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................. vi 

GETTING TOGETHER......................................................................................................1 

 Vincent Orange 

A GLIDER IN THE PROPWASH OF THE ROYAL AIR FORCE? ...............................30 

David R. Mets 

THE LEGEND OF LAURENCE KUTER........................................................................64 

Daniel R. Mortensen 

PATTON AND WEYLAND...........................................................................................100 

 David Spires 

APPENDIX......................................................................................................................108 

BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................................................................................124 

ii
Forward 

It was inevitable that the airman’s perspective regarding the employment of airpower in an 

operational theater would surface in North Africa, the first major American offensive of World 

War II. The publication of Field Manuals (FM) 31-35, Aviation in Support of Ground Forces, 

and 100-20, Command and Employment of Air Power, was a manifestation of how airmen 

looked at the command of airpower, the selection of missions, and the assignment of priorities. 

The institutionalized conflict between soldiers and airmen over air employment that raised its

head in Africa continues, regardless of the recorded combat experiences of, and the individual 

rapport among, field commanders. 

North Africa provided a stage to expose these deep-seated conflicting views of airpower. 

The soldier viewed the war in terms of brigades, divisions, corps, and armies; some saw the 

application of airpower as being in direct support of their own combat formations. The airman, 

on the other hand, saw the application of airpower in terms of the entire theater of operations; 

therefore, he saw it employed in situations and against enemy forces presenting the greatest

threat in the theater. The establishment of three priorities for air missions-superiority,

interdiction, and close air support- was a focus of his perspective of theater air operations. 

Historical experience greatly affected the advocacy of this theater-wide operational scheme, 

particularly the way airpower was initially commanded and employed in North Africa. As 

commander of the 33d Fighter Group throughout the campaign, I participated in the testing of 

Air Force doctrine. A number of circumstances suggested that using the African experience as a 

model for doctrinal change was not appropriate. Among these were insufficient aircraft, lack of 

replacements, untrained personnel, inadequate all-weather airfields, and a lack of radar with 

extensive communications systems. Moreover, the command and employment of the available 

airpower in North Africa was flawed. Like other fighter groups, the fighter group I commanded 

was committed piecemeal, with insufficient forces. from one mission assignment to another-all 

with predictable results, including high losses and unsatisfactory effect on the German air and 

ground forces facing us at that time. 

The commanding general of II Corps considered the XII Air Support Command part of his 

command and therefore subject to the mission of II Corps. In addition, the 33d Fighter Group 

initially provided umbrella cover over the ground commander's deployed troops and directly

attacked targets in front of these units. In the north, Royal Air Force (RAF) 242 Group was being 

employed in the same manner in support of the British army. Between the First Army in the 

north and II Corps in the south was the French XIX Corps, which considered the 33d as its 

support group via the XII Air Support Command. No single air command was responsible for 

gaining air superiority and interdicting German ground forces that were moving into and within 

the area of combat, even though the XII Bomber Command under Gen James H. “Jimmy”

Doolittle was bombing German airfields in North Africa and Italy. 

Along with an air campaign needing a focus to gain control of the air and interdict the 

battlefield, there was a need to reorganize the command structure. This need was apparent even 

iii
before Casablanca and the debacle at Kasserine Pass. In addition, with the British Eighth Army

and Desert Air Force moving into Tunisia, Allied actions had to be closely coordinated to

prevent mutual interference. Even without a Casablanca Conference, a reorganization would 

have occurred. 

Although the Casablanca Conference of January 1943 was renowned for the decision made 

there to continue the daylight bombing of Germany, its effect on the command and employment

of theater airpower was even more profound. In essence, the decision to establish a tactical and 

strategic air force under a single air commander (Northwest African Air Forces under Gen Carl 

A Spaatz) created a theater command structure with coequal air and ground commanders under 

Gen Dwight D. Eisenhower. By this arrangement, the air and ground component commanders 

received equal footing. Previously, tactical airpower was subordinated, thus limiting the ability 

of XII Air Support Command and RAF 242 Group to influence the determination of theater 

strategy, the employment of forces, and the assignment of priority in application. It is against this

background that the long-standing ideas of airmen brightened, leading to the development and 

publication of FM 100-20 and, later, to revisions of the basic tactical doctrinal manual (FM 31-

35). These manuals served the purpose, perhaps too shrilly in retrospect, of articulating what 

airmen believed about airpower and how their perspectives on its use related to the views of 

ground forces. These manuals continue even today to be the foundation of what airmen believe 

about airpower and its relationship to the other services in a combat theater. 

The North Africa experience provided a model for the organization and employment of 

tactical airpower in subsequent campaigns in Europe, Korea, Vietnam, and the Gulf War. In each 

of these campaigns, planners have continued to refine, expand, and improve the effectiveness of 

tactical air support for all forces in a theater. The priorities for employment are a function of the 

most pressing threat and the greatest opportunity for imposing a major effect on the fighting 

ability of the opposing forces. The flexibility of tactical air (its greatest asset) permits a shifting 

focus between air superiority, interdiction, and close air support in accordance with the priority

established by the overall commander. Differences in opinion on the employment of forces will 

continue among air, ground, and sea commanders in combat situations. However, when the 

overall commander in the theater makes a decision on the strategy and priority of operations, the 

air component commander must and will apply his forces in accordance with that decision. 

WILLIAM W. MOMYER, Gen, USAF, Retired 

iv
About the Editor 

Daniel R. Mortensen has been associated with US Air Force history programs since 1978. 

He is currently affiliated with the Air Staff History Office, Pentagon, Washington, D.C. Dr. 

Mortensen's publications include a US Air Force manuscript on the doctrine and practices of 

tactical airpower and the US Army Center of Military History's World War II Close Air Support 

Joint Operations: North Africa. He is a frequent presenter at historical association meetings and

has taught numerous classes on the history of airpower. 

v
Introduction 

Long before the current struggle between the Army and Air Force over the deep attack 

mission, the services debated employment of air resources. Among the earliest roles and 

missions issues of the 1930s, the Army argued that ground commanders needed to control air 

resources for “unity of command” principles. Airmen countered by citing “centralized control” 

principles. Historians have often suggested that the issue of centralized command was settled by

the Battle of Kasserine Pass early in World War II. Continued research has shown that the 

centralized air command, as well as air superiority, was well established in published doctrine 

several years before World War II. Nevertheless, Africa was argued to be an effective testing 

ground even though it could hardly fill that role because of the immaturity of operations at that

time. No one was arguing that support of land operations was an inappropriate role for airpower. 

The argument was how to carry out that task. 

In any regard, some 60 years ago in Washington, D.C., through the winter and spring, 1942-

43, officers on George C. Marshall's Army General Staff and Henry H. Arnold's Army Air

Forces staff debated, manipulated, and eventually refined a very strong declaration about the 

employment of airpower in worldwide combat theaters. Fully aware of controversy, long 

endemic to air and ground combat relations, Marshall winced but signed his acceptance. On 21 

July 1943, the Government Printing Office published FM 100-20, Command and Employment of 

Air Power, the most striking policy statement in Air Force history. 

Ever after, Air Force planners and spokesmen have pointed to this document and the earliest 

experience of World War II combat in North Africa as indubitable proof that an air force, 

independent and coequal to Army ground forces, was needed. The field manual touched on air 

leadership in Washington, combat theaters, and subordinate field commands, but the central 

focus was to clarify the relationship between land power and airpower in ground combat

conditions. 1

 The manual announced to ground generals, long covetous of, if not accustomed to, 

controlling all ground and air components on the battlefield, that the air element had an 

independent status in modern mobile warfare. Ultimately, FM 100-20 became the supporting

document of tactical aviation, conferring greater independence and influence in much the way 

that Air War Power Division Plan 1 (AWPD-l), the primary World War II plan written in 1941 

for offensive air warfare, gave airmen authority in strategic bombing campaigns. 

With all its importance and long shelf life, it is remarkable that historians have only recently

begun to investigate and understand the physical settings and circumstances behind FM 100-20. 

That consummate historian, Tom Mayock, who wrote the originating historical report in the 

second volume of Craven and Cate, Army Air Forces in World War II, admitted frankly that he

had not had sufficient documents to validate basic events. 2

 Much of our conventional wisdom 

today is based on inadequate research and hurried reporting after the war; myths and 

misconceptions arose early and continue to abound. 

Involvement in a joint world demands that Air Force people understand Air Force history. 

This basic requirement gives special purpose to the following commemorative account derived

from four papers presented at the annual Military History Society conference that convened in 

April 1993 in Kingston, Canada. 

vi
The first paper, Essay 1 in this book, describes the organization, doctrine, operational 

practices, and personality of the British-led air forces in the desert west of Cairo from 1940 to 

1943. The second paper, Essay 2, describes and analyzes the events in northwest Africa during 

Operation Torch and the Battle for Tunisia in the winter and spring of 1942-43. The third essay 

analyzes policy development in Washington, showing, among other things, how policy is a 

product of headquarters thinking as much as a result of practical experience. Essay 4 analyzes the

great tactical aviation exercise in northwest Europe, emphasizing the famous cooperation 

between George S. Patton and Otto P. Weyland. 

Some issues stand out.. Some of FM 100-20's concepts had a long history; some were new. 

The idea of coequality, for example, had been promoted successfully with the formation of US 

Air Force General Headquarters (GHQ Air Force) in 1935, the appointment of an assistant 

secretary of war for air in April 1941, the independent war planning of AWPD-l in mid-1941, 

and the autonomous and coordinate responsibilities associated with organizing the Army Air 

Forces in March 1942. 3

 Indeed, formal doctrine, notably that in FM 31-35 (published in April 

1942) and in Eisenhower's Operational Memo 17 (published in England in late 1942 for

Operation Torch), acknowledged the independent basis of air-ground relations. 

In spite of much written to the contrary, Eisenhower promoted independent air command in 

Africa from the very beginning. The failures in Tunisia and, especially, at Kasserine Pass in 

March 1943 occurred not because of improper doctrine, particularly not because of decentralized 

air command, but because of logistical bottlenecks-getting troops with adequate guns, trucks,

planes, fuel, and service people, to the right place, in the right portions at appropriate times. In 

truth, inadequately trained and equipped American forces faced a superior enemy. Even the 

senior American airman, Carl A. Spaatz, said existing doctrine was satisfactory; only practice

was needed to produce successful operations. 

Flexibility of command and mission assignment, as well as air superiority, were the key air

principles upon which airmen in Africa, both American and British, acted. Principles regarding

mission priorities were understood by air commanders and most theater leaders in general. Air

superiority, for example, had long been registered in doctrinal manuals, and that essential had not 

been ignored in Africa. It was just not attainable in Africa until April 1943 when a sufficient 

quantity of Allied forces and equipment was in place. 

The provenance of FM 100-20 spoke volumes about doctrine development. The publication 

can be characterized as having its roots in Washington with flavoring from the field, rather than 

the other way around. American air combat experience had not been regularized sufficiently to 

provide operational patterns useful for published doctrine. As nearly everyone knows, British air 

combat experience had provided lessons to the Americans for years, but only recently have

historians determined that some of the important pronouncements of the manual were contrary to

British aviation constitutions. The British did not use the three-tier priority system of tactical

aviation (first, air superiority; second, interdiction; and third, close air support). Flexibility of

command was more important to them, and establishing formal priorities contradicted flexibility.

The three-tier system was invented in Washington, not in Africa or elsewhere in the field. 

During the remainder of the war, the American military employed neither the three-tier 

system nor the coequality principle in any systematic fashion. One has a difficult time imagining 

a two-star general such as O. P. Weyland, commander of XIX Tactical Air Command, as coequal

to Lt Gen George S. Patton, commander of the Fifth Army. Evidence of such a personal nature is 

difficult to validate, but a careful investigation of the Patton-Weyland relationship suggests that 

FM 100-20 may have affected the atmosphere of air-ground relations. Nevertheless, careful 

vii
study shows that Patton easily agreed to the independence and authority of his supporting air 

commander. 

Perhaps Washington's strongly stated advocacy of aviation helped establish a more level 

playing field from the airmen's point of view, encouraging other ground commanders in Europe

to repress residual antipathy to their air support specialists. Perhaps FM 100-20 aroused the ire of 

ground leaders, driving their arguments underground only to surface in later antagonisms. The

effectiveness of ground -air aviation operations really came from the most fundamental factor of

the human situation-good personal relations and fellowship. 

The leading airman in Europe, General Spaatz, had already established the model for good 

air-ground cohesion. The model is as viable today as it was 60 years ago. Because of his efforts, 

airmen had good working relationships with Eisenhower and top theater staff officers. Those 

relationships were based on good service, not on pronouncements of principles, politically 

correct tactical doctrine, or a demand for equality. It is time for airmen to investigate more 

closely the more carefully recorded accounts of events in northwest Africa in the first year of 

American combat experience there. The early phases of combat are most fascinating for lessons

learned at a time when problems of pandemic proportions surfaced to complicate command 

direction. The experience should be valid in Gulf War analysis as well as future combat

situations. 

Notes 

1

 Field Manual 100-20, Command and Employment of Air Power, 23 July 1943, 1. 

2

 Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Cate, eds, The Army Air Forces in World War II,

vol. 2, Europe: Torch to Pointblank, August 1942 to December 1943 (1949; new imprint, 

Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 1983). 

3

 Air War Plans Division Plan I, Munitions Requirements of the Army Air Forces 

(Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 12 August 1941, copy at AF Historical 

Research Agency [AFHRA], Maxwell AFB, Ala.). 

viii
Getting Together 

Tedder, Coningham, and Americans in the Desert and Tunisia, 1940-43 

Vincent Orange 

Arthur Tedder, who would become one of World War II’s great commanders, arrived in 

Cairo on 10 December 1940 as a newly appointed acting air marshal to serve as deputy to Air 

Marshal Sir Arthur Longmore, head of Middle East Air Command. 1

 Longmore was recalled to 

London five months later and, on 1 June 1941, Tedder’s appointment as Longmore’s successor

was formally confirmed. He was to become a substantive air marshal. “Cooperation, sound 

administration and flexibility,” wrote military historian Basil Liddell Hart, “were the keynotes of 

Tedder’s air strategy and tactics.” 2

 And Tedder had the ear of the Royal Air Force’s (RAF) two 

most important officers, both of whom had earned the respect of Prime Minister Winston 

Churchill: Air Chief Marshal Sir Charles Portal (chief of the Air Staff) and Air Chief Marshal Sir 

Wilfrid Freeman (vice chief, responsible for the day-to-day running of the RAF, and Portal’s 

closest service friend). 

American Aid Essential 

Even before he arrived in Cairo, Tedder realized that neither Britain’s aircraft industry nor 

her merchant fleet would be able to supply him with the modern fighters, bombers, and 

transports he needed. American aircraft would be essential for survival, let alone victory, in the

desert war. Therefore, intimate relations with Americans would also be essential. Although 

getting together with them-and still more, staying together-would prove as difficult as making

and maintaining a marriage, he accepted as a working principle Dr. Samuel Johnson’s dictum 

that “Marriage has many pains, but celibacy has no pleasures.” 3

 

Tedder favored an expedition mounted from Egypt early in 1941 to help Greece resist a 

German invasion, even though the British faced certain defeat there and risked losing all the 

gains made at Italian expense in the desert. As he later recalled, “one factor was particularly 

strong in my mind, and that was the possible effect on the United States and their attitude 

towards us if we went back on our guarantee to Greece. I knew how important it was that 

nothing should endanger the programmes for the supply of munitions, and particularly aircraft,

plans which were being very actively drawn up, and which might very well fall through if the 

United States lost their faith in US.” 4

 Without that “faith,” the Anglo-American marriage would 

fail, and a celibate Britain would lose the war. 

Tedder welcomed President Franklin Roosevelt’s announcement in August 1941 that a 

military supply airline had been created as a practical means of moving desperately needed

aircraft and cargo across the Atlantic to West Africa and on to Cairo. It was operated by Pan 

American Airways for the War Department, but Tedder soon found that airline to be so eager to 

pursue its own profit and to exclude British Overseas Airways from the African route that his

1 
conduct of military operations was seriously harmed. Civilian minions of Juan Trippe, the 

notorious ruler of Pan American, educated Tedder so well that he could get along with almost

any Americans for the rest of his career, let alone the war years. Moreover, Tedder’s distrust of

Trippe’s agents and their methods was widely shared in Washington. For example, Secretary of

the Interior Harold Ickes considered Trippe “an unscrupulous person who cajoles and buys his 

way.” He was so devious, recalled one airline chief, that if the front door was open, he would go 

in by a side window. And Adolph Berle, the State Department’s aviation expert, declared, “I do 

not trust Pan American farther than I can see it.” Nevertheless, it was the only airline carrying

the American flag abroad before Pearl Harbor-and Pan Am had helped camouflage war 

preparations by building bases in the Pacific, South America, and West Africa. Tedder resisted 

Pan American valiantly, but neither the Air Ministry nor British civil aviation authorities 

matched his resolution. 5

 

During 1941 American airmen arrived to help erect, repair, and maintain American aircraft. 

They were also to build airfields. They sympathized with Tedder over Pan American’s brazen 

self-regard and, inspired by the unfailing good humor of RAF ground crews even during

sandstorms when everyone carried on working “with a grin on his face,” were tireless in all 

practical matters. The Americans also admired the Brits’ ingenuity. “I have seen airplane repair 

shops where they are going ahead with the job,” reported Brig Gen Elmer E. Adler in November

1941, “and I will be damned if I have been able to discover more than a few hand tools in their 

possession, but they still roll out the ships.” 6

 

Unfortunately, the Americans also expounded their views on grand strategy in these prePearl Harbor days, explaining to Tedder how he should conduct operations even though their 

personal experience of current warfare was at that time nil. In a letter to his wife, Tedder noted 

how confidently they “could lay down the law about things of which they knew next to nothing.” 

He added, however, “I did my best, with an effort, to appear duly interested and impressed.” This 

capacity for restraint would be rewarded after Pearl Harbor and Clark Field. “The only bright 

patch in the clouds,” he later recalled, “was that the Americans openly said that they would no 

longer go about telling us how to do our job.” They were “not quite so convinced now that they

knew all about everything. This, at least, was a relief.” By refraining from crowing over a 

humiliated partner, Tedder earned (as in marriage) gratitude and future influence. 7

 

During 1942 it would be the Americans, not the British, who won Tedder’s battles for him 

on the Pan American front. The War Department canceled Pan American’s African contracts,

“militarized” its bases and ferrying service, and set up an Air Transport Command equipped with 

aircraft leased to 11 carriers. Pan American’s African network disappeared in December. Tedder 

never forgot these battles, which confirmed him as a faithful (though not uncritical) partner to his 

American allies for the rest of his life. 8

 

At the end of June 1942, Maj Gen Lewis H. Brereton brought a small American air force to 

the Middle East. Nominally, his contingent was independent, but actually it fought under British 

direction and was carefully mixed in with RAF squadrons until it was sufficiently experienced to 

operate on its own. Tedder’s method worked the more easily because in flying skill, pure and 

simple, the Americans were already excellent. “They are learning from us,” he told Portal in

October, “and we are learning from them. I was glad to hear this from both sides.” British airmen 

were already benefiting from service alongside Australians, New Zealanders, and South

Africans, so the arrival of Americans only enriched the mixture further, making of Tedder’s air 

force a truly international weapon. Brereton and his men adjusted to two novel situations: they 

had never before served under either a foreigner or a theater airman. 9

 

2
Brereton later admitted to Roderic Owen, Tedder’s first biographer, that “we were a mixture 

of brass and humility and we didn’t like being told too much what to do, even when we didn’t 

know how to do it.” To his own surprise, however, Brereton found himself “100 percent sold on 

Tedder from the word go.” He had expected “a sort of stuffed shirt, or something; you know the

sort of traditional idea we Americans are supposed to have about you British.” Tedder also won 

over Brereton’s men, whom he spoke to at Lydda in Palestine (now Lod in Israel). “One often 

heard a lot of sentimental stuff about the British and Americans being first cousins and even 

brothers,” he said. “This is bunk. You are a pack of goddam [sic] Yanks. You think you speak 

English, but you don’t. You dislike English food, but your own only looks better. You don’t like 

being here, and I don’t either.” 

All of this doubtless came as a refreshing blast to these Americans after having been 

exposed to plenty of hot air about the obligations of the two greatest democratic nations to 

oppose fascist aggression, though Tedder went on to make this very point in his own blunt 

manner: “We’re only here because we both believe certain things are worth fighting for, so let’s

get on with it.” When he finished, recalled Brereton, “they were all sold on him, no doubt about 

that. He didn’t talk down to a man. There was never anything in his attitude to indicate that he

thinks himself superior to anyone else or to make us feel we’d been in the war for only two 

months. After that, I always had to let him know when I was going out for an inspection and as 

like[ly] as not he would come too. He got around to every American unit damn near as often as I 

did.” 10 

One problem agitating Tedder in September 1942 would never be solved, from a British 

point of view, during or after the war. “All the Americans are paid at a most extravagant rate,” he 

complained to Portal. “Their ideas of rations, comforts and amenities are also extravagant 

compared with our standards.” Having the money to pay whatever was asked for supplies and 

services in Egypt or Palestine, Americans either left nothing for their “cousins” to buy or 

encouraged local merchants, male or female, to raise their prices beyond British pockets. 

Consequently, “there are the makings of very bitter feelings on the part of our own troops.”

Tedder went on to tell Portal that “the Americans do not appear to have the first idea regarding

economy in the use of air transport. They use DC-3s quite indiscriminately for wholesale 

transport of canned drinks and foods and other luxuries and for occasional joyrides by American 

Generals and whatnots. Whether we will ever be able to educate them remains to be seen-I am

afraid I doubt it.” Thus far in the war-and, indeed, thus far in his career-”economy of effort” had 

been for Tedder a necessity elevated to principle, given the paucity of equipment available to the 

RAF. From this time on, however, the astounding profligacy of American production (and 

methods) would “educate” him. He would not be reluctant, personally or professionally, to enjoy 

either. 11 

Tedder 

On 9 November 1942, Tedder received the ultimate American accolade: an appearance on 

the cover of Time magazine. “Tedder of North Africa” was made the subject of a laudatory

profile-although it did describe him as “a pale, thin gremlin.” Operation Torch (the Allied 

landings in Northwest Africa led by Lt Gen Dwight D. Eisenhower) had just begun, rapidly

bringing to a head questions about command and supply of air forces and coordination with land 

and sea forces which this gremlin had been pondering for the past two years. 

3
What were these questions, and why was Arthur Tedder invited to answer them? Until 

December 1940, he had not served in North Africa since 1918 and his record between the wars 

suggested “a man of nuts and bolts” (in Churchill’s words) who lacked the charisma believed 

necessary for wartime command. 12 Moreover, he was a university graduate who had published a 

book. These were uncommon feats among senior officers of his generation and not widely 

regarded as useful to a battlefield commander. Worse still, recorded one contemporary, Tedder 

was “the sort of chap who always wore his hat slap on the middle of his head.” He had not been a 

famous fighter pilot in the First World War, he made no dramatic or pioneering flights after that 

war, and no boisterous, endearing anecdotes were told about him. “I wanted to be liked,” he said 

once, “but I wasn’t much.” 13 Even his appointment to Cairo was as second choice to a nowforgotten officer, Owen Tudor Boyd. En route to Cairo, the unlucky Boyd’s navigator 

inadvertently landed him in Sicily instead of Malta. Almost a year later, Tedder’s position was 

still so insecure that Churchill invited Wilfrid Freeman to replace him. Freeman refused, as he 

put it, to play either Judas or Brutus to his friend and protégé. 14 

Boyd’s bad luck would also offer Air Vice Marshal Arthur Coningham 15 an opportunity in 

July 1941 when Tedder decided to get rid of Air Commodore Raymond Collishaw, an

outstanding Canadian fighter pilot of the First World War who commanded what became the 

famous Western Desert Air Force. In Tedder’s opinion, Collishaw was too anxious to attempt

every task in daily operations himself and too often foolishly optimistic about what could be 

done with a handful of men and aircraft. Tedder could reasonably suppose that Coningham 

would avoid these mistakes, but so too might several other officers better known to him. 16 

Coningham 

In fact, Coningham was not Tedder’s first choice; an officer named Leonard Slatter was. But

Slatter, already serving in the Middle East, was anxious to return home to attend to some

domestic upset and, without much enthusiasm, Tedder asked for Coningham instead. Slatter, 

who went on to enjoy an entirely honorable career which is now entirely forgotten, received a 

single passing mention in Tedder’s well-known war memoirs, With Prejudice. Coningham, in 

contrast, came to be regarded by Tedder (in Liddell Hart’s words) as “the real hero” of the desert

war. 17 It is worth remembering that both Tedder and Coningham got into that war (where they

established their reputations) as second choices. According to Napoleon, good luck is the quality 

above all to look for in generals-and these RAF officers were certainly lucky. 

Tedder’s lack of enthusiasm for Coningham was soundly based on three facts: he had had 

nothing to do with fighters since the end of the First World War, he had not served in Egypt for

15 years, and he had never attended Staff College. Coningham was proud of his academic 

ignorance (and the more famous he became, the more often he boasted of his ignorance). In this 

respect, he was indeed unique among RAF commanders of the Second World War. A compelling 

reason for Coningham’s selection was probably provided by Air Chief Marshal Sir Edgar 

Ludlow-Hewitt, a wise and grim man, not given to praising quickly or highly. As head of

bomber command, he had commended Coningham (then commander of 4 Group) to Portal with 

unusual warmth. If Portal passed this commendation on, his friend Tedder was no doubt 

favorably impressed. Coningham’s distinction as an early “bomber baron” thus cleared a path for 

him to earn far greater distinction as a master of tactical airpower. 18 

Personally, Coningham was everything Tedder was not. Famous and much-decorated for his 

feats as a combat, air display, and long-distance pilot, Coningham was famous also, within the 

4
RAF, for his place in society yachting circles and his prowess at polo, golf, and other sports. Not

a man to wear his cap dead straight or to be described as “a pale, thin gremlin,” Coningham was

a man of style and presence. “Big, masculine, confident,” as one air marshal recalled, “he had an 

easy, attractive personality, a ready and colorful flow of talk.” Tedder soon learned, however, 

that Coningham’s flamboyance masked a strong, self-regarding personality. His “outstanding 

characteristic,” recorded another air marshal, “lay in his ability to keep his own counsel. I never 

felt I really knew what was going on behind his dark brown eyes.” In other words, Coningham 

was a careful listener (as top commanders usually are), taking in what was said and readily using

what he heard to shape his own ideas. 19 

A Bit of Luck 

Both Tedder and Coningham had the great advantage of being second generation 

commanders in North Africa. They never faced overwhelming enemy strength, as unluckier

commanders did elsewhere during the early war years in Poland, Scandinavia, France, and 

Russia. Military students have known since antiquity that it is unwise to command defending 

forces at the outbreak of war. Ill-trained men, inadequate weapons, insufficient supplies, untested 

doctrine regarding the effective use of resources, and the aggressor’s careful preparation are 

likely to bring defeat and therefore dismissal. But if the defending state manages to avoid 

conquest, there may come a time when well-trained men, adequate weapons, sufficient supplies, 

practical doctrine regarding the effective use of resources, and the aggressor’s mistakes will 

bring victory and therefore promotion. Although the latter commander may be no more able or

diligent than the former, he will certainly be better rewarded, as Tedder and Coningham found in 

North Africa. It may not be fair, but it is what happens. 

Raymond Collishaw, for example, having been sharply criticized in Tedder’s memoirs,

responded six years later in his own memoirs by completely ignoring (save for two passing 

references) the man under whom he served for eight hectic months. 20 Collishaw had good reason

for his attitude. He and his staff had recognized in 1940 the basic strategy of desert warfare-that 

it was “a struggle for airfields and ports.” Air Marshal Sir Peter Drummond (Tedder’s deputy) 

would echo this truth in October 1943. “Whoever held the airfields on the shores of the 

Mediterranean,” wrote Drummond, “could pass his own ships through that sea with reasonable 

safety and could forbid the route to the ships of the enemy.”21 

Collishaw identified the problems involved in combining the punch of fighter and bomber

forces (between themselves and between them and the ground forces) and tried to solve them. He 

did his best to establish secure and reliable communications, fix realistic bomb lines, and rank 

targets in order of priority. Wherever possible, forward landing grounds were laid out swiftly, 

kept clear, guarded vigilantly, and amply supplied with water, food, and fuel. (In practice, this 

proved a crippling reservation.) An attempt was made to provide squadrons with their own 

transport, and they tried to carry their own workshops with them. They exercised their own pilots 

regularly, knowing that training facilities were negligible. 

Having spent five years commanding a shoestring air force in Egypt, Collishaw was 

perfectly well aware that strength must not be wasted (after the Italian fashion) on standing 

patrols-wearing out men and machines, and consuming precious reserves of fuel and spares. 

Above all, he understood that air superiority was to be obtained and maintained before any other 

task-even close support for troops in advance or retreat-could be attempted with any reasonable 

hope of success. He had no radar, a poor radio network, and much less signals intelligence than 

5
his successors later enjoyed. Moreover, he commanded a motley force, composed largely of what

the historian John Terraine rightly called “assorted antiques.” Nevertheless, the RAF under

Collishaw showed plenty of tactical ingenuity despite depending on equipment that was at best

obsolete. They forged excellent relations with their Army commander (Lt Gen Sir Richard

O’Connor) and concluded a triumphant campaign against Italians who had an apparently 

overwhelming numerical superiority. Had it not been for the Greek diversion, O’Connor and 

Collishaw might well have captured Tripoli in the spring of 1941, ending the desert war and 

obliging Gen Erwin Rommel to further his ambition elsewhere. 22 

Rightly or wrongly, Tedder decided that the Canadian had outlived his usefulness in the 

desert and replaced him with a New Zealander. Tedder and Coningham grew to like and respect 

each other, helped by having different personal qualities yet similar opinions about proper 

methods of command. After nearly two years of working together, Tedder seized an opportunity 

in June 1943 to commend him to Gen Henry H. Arnold, head of the US Army Air Forces 

(USAAF). A report issued on 6 May by the Intelligence Service in Washington “amazed” 

Tedder: “The writer appears to have completely misunderstood the Amy-Air organization and 

the relationships between me and [General Sir Harold] Alexander and between Coningham and 

[Lt Gen Sir Bernard] Montgomery. The great majority of his statements cover the tactical battle 

and impute to me tactical policy and action which derive from Coningham; in fact, in nine cases 

out of ten where he uses my name, the name of Coningham should be used.” This is a letter that 

vividly illustrates both Tedder’s generous spirit and his high regard for Coningham. Arnold 

replied with uncharacteristic humility on 5 July: The errors, he wrote, “which you were kind

enough to point out so clearly, are regretted.” 23 

Coningham’s mastery of “the tactical battle,” which had been established by the end of the 

Tunisian campaign, was founded on his personal experience as a squadron commander during 

the last months of the First World War. By the time of the Armistice, he recalled in 1946, 

fighters and fighter-bombers were cooperating closely with tanks and leading the Allied advance, 

making the German retreat “expensive and chaotic.” He emphasized the importance of this 

period “because the principles there thrashed out have remained constant, only their degree and 

their application changing in accordance with the technical advance of aircraft, weapons, modern 

aids and the method of control.” The command of air forces and the concentration of effort in 

support of land forces in November 1918, he believed, compared well with modem practice. 

Contact between soldiers and airmen was very close, and mutual appreciation cemented both 

forces into a team. With those memories in mind, much of Coningham’s best effort in the Second 

World War was devoted to restoring that “mutual appreciation.” 24 

Tedder had told Coningham that his first task, on going out to the desert in July 1941, was to 

“get together” with the army commander. This was, as Coningham wrote after the war, a 

decision of “fundamental importance and had a direct bearing on the combined fighting of the 

two services until the end of the War.” 25 His opinion is supported by that of Field Marshal Lord 

Michael Carver who, in evaluating airpower in the Second World War, wrote, “by far the most

significant contribution [to victory] was made by the tactical air forces in support of the army,” 26

Cooperation, however, whether between or within services, is not to be achieved any more easily 

than a successful marriage. It requires time, goodwill, and constant attention far more than rules

and regulations. Essential though these are, most systems can be made to work if goodwill is 

present. Likewise, all systems are easily thwarted if it isn’t, Much depends, and always will,

upon the personalities of the individuals concerned. 

6
The army responded to Coningham’s initiative and agreed to set up a joint headquarters 

when the Eighth Army was formed in September 1941. In that same month, Churchill ruled (in 

response to Tedder’s arguments, relayed to him by Portal) that ground forces must not expect “as 

a matter of course” to be protected against aerial attack. “Above all, the idea of keeping standing

patrols of aircraft over our moving columns should be abandoned.” Hopes of winning and 

keeping air superiority would be undermined by this “mischievous practice.” Whenever a battle 

was in prospect, the army commander was to “specify” to the air commander the tasks he wanted 

performed, both before and during the battle, but the air commander had to decide how best to 

carry them out. 27 

These fundamental rulings were to be widely publicized and vigorously enforced by 

Coningham, with Tedder’s wholehearted support, during the rest of the desert war, often in the 

face of angry or bewildered opposition from soldiers of all ranks, By November 1942, when

Operation Torch began, these rulings had long been accepted (however reluctantly) by the Eighth

Army. Unfortunately, they were not conveyed to the commanders of that operation, whether 

British or American. 28 Failures in the transmission of information from the desert back to Britain

and on to the United States are typical of an ancient theme in military history: the reluctance of

tribes, nations, and armed forces to learn except from their own experience. The cost in lives and

material has been so heavy and the instances of defeat suffered or victory delayed so numerous

that more serious attention is nowadays paid to “lessons learned” than used to be the case. 

A Joint Army-Air Directive 

Meanwhile, on 30 September 1941, following exercises in which Coningham took the 

keenest interest, a joint army-air directive on “Direct Air Support” was issued. The directive 

enunciated two aspects of air support: defensive (to impede or halt the enemy’s ground attack in 

general and dive bombers in particular) and offensive (to destroy ground forces and so permit a 

counterattack). For defensive support, the most suitable targets (selected by air reconnaissance) 

must often lie out of the sight of soldiers, and Coningham already realized that soldiers must

therefore be persuaded to trust his decision that hitting these targets would help them-eventually, 

if not immediately. Similarly, he was aware of the need to persuade soldiers to accept that the 

only constant protection against dive bombers was their own ground fire. There would never be

time to summon fighters once an attack I had begun, and although Coningham \ was determined 

to make soldiers understand that standing patrols were completely out of the question, he would 

order fighter sweeps at times when dive-bomber raids were thought most likely. For offensive 

support, his light bombers could certainly be effective when attacking at low levels, but soldiers 

must realize that such attacks were only feasible when surprise was likely, expected resistance

was slight, and the target (never within 500 yards of friendly troops) was clearly visible. These 

conditions would not, of course, survive the first explosions, and any degree of organized, 

determined ground fire would quickly exact a heavy toll of light bombers. Friendly ground 

forces advancing beyond the range of their own artillery support could be assisted, but whenever 

artillery support was available, Coningham consistently withheld his light bombers. 29 

The directive required an “Air Support Control,” to be established under Coningham’s 

personal direction. It comprised army and RAF radio operators in regular contact with their 

respective fighting units and with each other in order to help him “meet, modify or reject”

requests for air support. Accepted requests were passed via the RAF signal system to an 

appropriate airfield for action. The ground commander was informed of the intended arrival time

7
and the strength of the support under way so that he could be prepared to take advantage of it. 

Airmen and soldiers, acutely aware of the need for an efficient recognition system, gradually 

devised one based on colored lights and ground signs. But the fact that both sides used each 

other’s captured equipment, especially trucks, posed a problem that would never be entirely 

solved. Specially trained army officers, known as air liaison officers, began to arrive in the desert 

in December 1941. They explained air methods to soldiers and army methods to airmen and, as 

they gained experience and confidence, they also explained why things went wrong and how best 

to right them. 30 

Operation Crusader 

The many muddles on the ground and in the air throughout Operation Crusader (a major 

offensive launched on 18 November 1941 to drive the enemy out of Cyrenaica) gave these 

liaison officers plenty to do. For Coningham, Crusader had begun a month earlier, on 14 

October, with a campaign intended to win air superiority and impede the enemy buildup of 

weapons and supplies. It was also intended to locate enemy formations, particularly armored 

divisions; to photograph airfields regularly; to identify defensive works, gun pits, petrol, 

ammunition dumps, and minefields; to survey roads and tracks, noting the traffic using them; and 

to check the shipping that was passing through enemy ports. Then came six days of intensive 

effort (13-18 November) while the army concentrated and moved forward. During these days, 

Coningham’s squadrons proved remarkably successful in preventing the Axis air forces from 

observing this concentration despite the fact that many combat-hardened British pilots had been 

lost in Greece or Crete and neither their replacements nor the survivors could match the Germans

in flying or fighting skill. Greater numbers of Hawker Hurricanes and Curtiss P-40C Tomahawks

compensated to some extent for their inferiority to the latest Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighters. 

Nevertheless, Coningham was obliged to withdraw squadrons from operations for further 

training and to replace several inadequate commanders with men from England who were better 

versed in modern aerial combat. 31 

Operation Crusader became a long and confused battle. It ended with Eighth Army holding a

position known as the Gazala Line, some 35 miles west of Tobruk, running southward from the 

coast to Bir Hacheim. During four anxious and strenuous months, Coningham’s powers of 

command were tested to the utmost as his inexperienced and inadequately equipped squadrons

struggled to assist ground forces that were themselves inexperienced and under equipped. Worse

still, these ground forces were in many cases very poorly commanded. Stinging defeats offset 

fleeting victories; but if it is true (as military history often suggests) that defeat is a better teacher 

than victory, then Coningham was well taught during these months. As late as October 1941, 

most pilots were still, in Tedder’s words, at a “village-cricket” (i.e., amateur) level of 

performance. 32 By the end of Crusader in February 1942, Coningham had coached them to a

professional standard and earned Tedder’s respect as an alert, calm leader. He had already earned

press approval, both British and American. “A New Name Appears,” headlined the London Star

on 20 November 1941, while Time magazine summed him up in its inimitable style on 1 

December as “a dark, strong-faced, deep-voiced, wise-cracking, non-smoking, six-footer from

New Zealand. He has a reputation for talent in co-operation-not a notable talent of previous RAF 

commanders in the Middle East.” 

8
Achilles’ Heel 

Coningham’s undoubted talents did not, however, include a sure grasp of logistics. As

defined by Air Marshal Sir Kenneth Hayr, logistics is “the science of planning and carrying out 

the movement and maintenance of forces.” 33 Tedder gradually recognized Coningham’s 

weakness in this vital area and, in February 1942, provided him with an expert assistant in Air 

Commodore Thomas Elmhirst. Rommel had less grasp than Coningham and, better still from an

Allied viewpoint, had neither a Tedder above him nor an Elmhirst at his side to see that he gave

it priority attention. “Without logistics,” wrote Hayr, “a force has no military utility. Of course a

force needs eyes, ears, and teeth, but logistics represents the heart, lungs and lifeblood: it is the 

life-support system without which the whole force would grind to a halt.” Although Hayr was

writing about the recent Gulf War, his words apply equally to all wars. “Tactics,” he concluded 

(and as the Western Desert and Tunisian campaigns demonstrated), are “the art of the logistically

possible.” 

Elmhirst began the war in 1939 under Coningham’s command and would end it there in 

1945, a record of which he was proud for the rest of his life. “On his arrival in the desert,” 

recalled Air Chief Marshal Sir Kenneth Cross (at that time Coningham’s most outstanding 

fighter leader), Elmhirst “quickly created order where there had been disorder, supply where 

there had been shortage, confidence where there had been doubt and, above all, a belief amongst 

those doing the fighting that here was a man who understood what they needed.” 34 It was 

Elmhirst who reorganized the Western Desert Air Force into mobile fighter, bomber, and 

reconnaissance wings, all with their own transport. Happily, a friendship grew between 

Coningham and Elmhirst, to the great advantage of both, for neither could have done the other’s 

job. Without Elmhirst’s management skills and absolute devotion, Coningham’s exceptional 

powers of inspiration, mastery of battlefield tactics, and ability to act sensibly in a crisis might 

not have kept him in high command all the way from Cairo to Berlin. 

Another friendship developed with George Beamish, Coningham’s senior Air Staff officer. 

Like Coningham, Beamish had been a top-class sportsman (in rugby, golf, and boxing) and was

also totally unflappable. Having escaped at the last moment from the Crete fiasco, nothing that 

happened in either the Western Desert campaign or the Tunisian campaign, except for a shortage 

of tea or pipe tobacco, struck Beamish as really serious. He would gently rebuke Coningham and 

Elmhirst for errors in the style and grammar of orders issued, even at the height of battle. This

serene composure appealed greatly to Coningham, who was himself (as Elmhirst recorded) “at 

his best on days of gloom.” 35 

Coningham, Beamish, and Elmhirst, linking operations and logistics out in the desert, were 

supported back in Cairo by an excellent team. Presided over by Tedder, the team managed vital 

personnel, administrative, technical, repair, and maintenance problems. Unless these were solved 

as they arose, operations would have been grievously affected, however perfect the doctrine 

governing the employment of aircraft or relations with other services and allies. No man, least of 

all a commander in wartime, is an island, able to function alone. He needs, and Coningham got, 

plenty of help. 

Tedder’s job was to command in chief, That is, to consider strategic options in consultation

with his opposite numbers in the navy and the army. He had also to deal with several Air 

Ministry departments and keep open his private line to Portal, chief of the Air Staff. And every

day he had to oversee the performance of both his Cairo staff and Coningham’s air force. Not 

surprisingly, Tedder eagerly seized every good reason (and every shaky excuse) to escape from 

9
his office into the desert to see for himself what was going on and so enjoy, however briefly, the 

exhilaration of being “at the sharp end.” While there, he practiced one of the more difficult arts 

of command. Discussing matters with Coningham, he would encourage, congratulate, advise, 

and, on occasion, criticize, but he would try not to interfere. It was Coningham’s job to command 

in the field, and he was entitled to wholehearted support unless or until Tedder felt that serious 

mistakes were being made, in which case prompt dismissal should follow. 

Axis Problems 

Individuals on the Axis side may well have matched or surpassed any of these men in 

personal ability, but they were not welded into a stable team. In addition, whatever problems

RAF officers had with their masters in London, with their colleagues in the army and the navy, 

or later with their American allies, they were never as insoluble as those which German and 

Italian airmen faced when dealing with Rommel in North Africa or Axis authorities in Berlin and 

Rome. From the viewpoint of Luftwaffe commanders, their situation worsened immeasurably 

during the Tunisian campaign. They were perplexed, harassed, and demoralized by the irrational 

antics of Adolf Hitler and his courtiers to a degree beyond the worst imaginings of the Allied

commanders. 

This absence of coordinated effort proved fatal. To choose a critical example from the desert 

war, the Luftwaffe commander (General Otto Hoffman von Waldau) found it even more difficult 

than Coningham did to get accurate, detailed information on a regular basis from army 

commanders about the position of friendly ground forces. Axis forces therefore received far less

support than von Waldau had available. They were more often bombed in error than were British 

forces, and attempts to coordinate ground and air attacks were perfunctory. Rommel actually

began his fatal invasion of Egypt late in June 1942 without even informing von Waldau, let alone 

waiting for him to move his airfields forward. This decision prevented the Luftwaffe from

harassing the British retreat and exposed Rommel’s own forces to constant aerial attack. Above 

all, it denied the Luftwaffe commander the opportunity to generate the panic upon which the 

success of Rommel’s invasion depended. 

Even though Coningham and his men fought skillfully and stubbornly in this crisis, they did 

no better than they should have, given Rommel’s mistakes, to say nothing of a steady flow of 

reliable intelligence about Axis strength and intentions from photo reconnaissance, prisoner 

interrogation, the tapping of radio messages, and the decoding of signals traffic. In planning 

operations, Coningham was accurately informed about the Luftwaffe’s order of battle, airfield 

serviceability, fuel stocks, casualties, and replacements. According to an official history, “British 

forces in North Africa were supplied with more information about more aspects of the enemy’s 

operations than any forces enjoyed during any important campaign of the Second World War.” 36

In RAF uniform, von Waldau might well have compared favorably with Coningham as an air 

commander. There can be no doubt that he would have welcomed the steady, powerful support

Coningham received from London, via Tedder in Cairo. 37 

After the fall of Tobruk in June 1942, Tedder told Portal: “If only our friend Rommel would 

run true to form and come bullocking on regardless, there might be a chance of knocking him

right out”-which is what he did and what was done, 38 Rommel had not grasped, even at that late 

date, the need to protect his sea supply lines from Malta’s attacks. Nor had he grasped the 

damage done to his land supply lines by Coningham’s attacks. Even before the capture of

Tobruk, Rommel had wasted nine days in June, using his air force to pound Bir Hacheim, a

10
fortified position held by French troops at the southern end of the Gazala Line. Those days so

sapped the Luftwaffe’s strength (recorded a Luftwaffe historian in March 1944) that it proved 

unable to exploit the opportunity provided by the British retreat from Gazala to El Alamein, a

distance of nearly 350 miles. During the three days that it took to execute this retreat, the Eighth 

Army lost only six soldiers killed by air attack. 39 

At the end of June, between Gibraltar and the untried defenses at El Alamein (a distance in 

excess of 2,000 miles), Malta was the sole British base. This “unsinkable aircraft carrier” was 

anchored a mere 60 miles south of Axis airfields in Sicily. Hitler’s decision on 23 June not to

attempt its conquest (planned in Operation Hercules) may have been one of the most fateful of 

the entire war. Despite their evident skill and determination, Britain’s army, navy, and RAF 

commanders in the Mediterranean could hardly have prevented a conquest of Malta had it been 

attempted with all the Axis power available before August 1942. “I ought to have known,” 

lamented Field Marshal Albert Kesselring after the war, “that a tactical success [such as Rommel

had achieved in reaching the Egyptian frontier] can only be exploited and sustained if the supply 

services are functioning faultlessly,” 40 He ought indeed to have known, and so ought the entire 

Axis war management machine; it is a point that has decided wars since ancient times, 

In February 1940 Rommel had asked a veteran general of the First World War for advice on 

the best way to command a panzer division. “You’ll find there are always two possible decisions 

open to you,” the veteran told him, “Take the bolder one-it’s always the best.” 41 Luckily for the

Allies, Rommel (backed by Hitler) followed this advice and thereby lost the Axis powers a royal 

chance of victory in the desert war. Tedder, a former staff college lecturer (the very model of an 

officer-type loathed by Rommel), might have commented: “There’s a lot of truth in that

principle. However, you must ask yourself not only where you’ll be if the bold decision works, 

but also where you’ll be if it doesn’t.” Rommel’s answer to the latter part might have been: “In 

front of powerful defenses at El Alamein, facing an army with secure supply lines, pouring in 

more of everything every day, whilst my own lines are very long and suffering constant attack by 

air and sea.” In other words, commanders should temper boldness with forethought and pay 

attention to logistics. Tedder and Coningham did; Rommel and Hitler didn’t. 

With Tedder’s approval, Coningham had made it his personal business to appoint 

subordinate commanders, promising them the same absence of interference, the same positive 

support, and the same threat of speedy removal in the event of failure that hovered over his own 

position. It would not be until August 1942 that these methods took firm hold in the British 

Eighth Army. Churchill then asked Tedder (who had temporarily earned his confidence) what 

should be done about the chaotic leadership of that army. (“Chaotic” is not too strong a word; 

orders to senior officers were regarded, by giver and receiver alike, as no more than a useful

basis for discussion.) Tedder replied that the selection, promotion, and removal of commanders 

should in future be made on the basis of performance instead of seniority, friendship, or 

regimental or family connections. The advent of General Bernard Montgomery ensured that 

Tedder’s advice was taken. 42 

Montgomery 

Which brings me to the partnership between Tedder and Coningham with Montgomery. 

Like those air marshals, the general arrived in the desert at short notice as a second choice and 

there took his chance to make a name. By August 1942, less than a year after its formation, the 

Eighth Army was in need of its fifth commander (General Sir Claude Auchinleck having twice

11
taken over when it became essential to sack, first, Alan Cunningham, and then Neil Ritchie). As

commander in chief in Cairo, Auchinleck could not indefinitely continue to lead the field army. 

The choice fell upon Lt Gen William “Strafer” Gott, an experienced desert warrior. Tragically, 

Gott died when the aircraft carrying him to Cairo to assume his appointment was shot down. 

Montgomery was then summoned from England as the Eighth’s sixth commander. At the same

time, Churchill fired Auchinleck and replaced him with General Alexander. 

Lt Gen Sir Bernard Montgomery

In the early days in North Africa, Montgomery worked closely 

with his airmen. Later, he was not so cheery with independent

airmen; he saw them as subordinates. (Source: US Air Force) 

As is well known, Montgomery became very mindful of airpower, perhaps more so than any

other Allied general of the Second World War. On taking command, he immediately moved his

headquarters to Coningham’s. “From that moment,” he later recalled, “we never looked back.” It 

was, in fact, an obvious move, restoring a situation only recently changed. Auchinleck had 

separated army-air headquarters, which had been together for most of the previous year, only 

under stress of the retreat to El Alamein. Coningham, left on his own, had discovered the ideal 

site for a headquarters at Burg-el-Arab. It was near the sea, had palm trees, fresh water, and an 

airstrip-and by desert standards, there were no flies. It was close to the only road through the 

desert, and good signals facilities were available. 43 

Montgomery’s early actions in seizing effective command of the Eighth Army delighted 

Tedder and Coningham. Sadly, their delight quickly changed to exasperation with his slow 

methods on the battlefield-unnecessarily slow, in their opinion, given Montgomery’s

overwhelming superiority in strength and detailed knowledge of Rommel’s intentions and 

weaknesses. Exasperation ultimately became open contempt as they learned of the lies and 

evasions with which Montgomery attempted to enhance his own fame, and as they observed his 

12
preference for the company of “young and adoring acolytes” (Sir Michael Howard’s words) who 

became old and adoring apologists. 44 After the Tunisian campaign. Montgomery steadfastly 

avoided regular contact with his fellow commanders (men who had the rank, character, and 

experience to are with him). 

No differences, personal or professional, that Tedder and Coningham had with American 

ground or air commanders came close to matching those they had with Montgomery. From 

Tunisia onward, these RAF officers and their American colleagues were always in complete

agreement that Montgomery was socially impossible, a fact which greatly assisted them in

resolving their own occasional disputes. “At least he’s not Monty” became an acknowledged 

bottom line-and it kept the men talking among themselves. Tedder and Coningham recognized 

that Montgomery represented a strong British resentment of increasing American manpower, 

material, and hence influence over the direction of Allied strategy. Perhaps they privately 

resented the American influence too, but they were sufficiently realistic to accept it as an 

essential price of victory; Montgomery and his supporters never did. 

Operation Torch 

Operation Torch began on 8 November 1942, with Anglo-American landings on the coasts 

of Morocco and Algeria. The Americans intended to advance rapidly eastward and occupy 

Tunisia. The battle of El Alamein had just ended and the pursuit of Rommel, who was retreating 

westward toward Tunisia, had just begun. Hitler poured fresh German land and air forces into 

Tunisia before either the Allies or Rommel could get there. By December it was already clear 

that a long, hard campaign must be fought in that country. One effect of the need to prepare for 

Torch had been the delay in providing the Western Desert Air Force with the latest Spitfires, 

which would have replaced the obsolete Hurricanes and P-40Es or P-40F Kittyhawks. In 

addition, Coningham could have made good use of more long-range, heavily armed Bristol 

Beaufighters or Lockheed P-38 Lightnings to harass the retreating columns. 

13
Martin Maryland 

American planes, trucks, and tanks underwrote British success in the 

Western Desert. Heavily armed and very light, these Martin Marylands 

sped away to attack enemy targets in Libya. (Source: National Archives)

Douglas C-47 

The C-47 served both British and US transport needs in North 

Africa. (Source: National Archives)

14
Consolidated B-24 

The B-24 fought with both British and US forces in North 

Africa. (Source: National Archives)

Curtiss P-40

The P-40 served British forces in the Western Desert and US 

forces in Tunisia. (Source: National Archives)

By December, on the other hand, the Ninth Air Force (formed under Brereton on 11 

November to embrace all USAAF units in the Middle East) was providing a vital transport 

service and a “flying pipeline” of aviation fuel to the front. “On one day,” noted Brereton, “fortynine C-47s carried 48,510 gallons of gas from El Adem to Agedabia, a distance of 425 miles by 

truck and 250 by aircraft. The flight was completed in an hour and fifty minutes. It would have

been a three-day trip for fifty-nine trucks.” When Americans first arrived in the desert, 

Coningham had said he wanted them to “profit by all our mistakes and by our successes.” He 

now spoke warmly to the British press about Anglo-American cooperation, which had become a 

major factor in operations. “We are a happy and I think competent family,” he said, “and the 

result is an efficient machine.” 45

15
Spitfire 

The British Spitfire was the Allies’ best air superiority 

fighter. (Source: National Air and Space Museum)

The new campaign posed fresh challenges to Tedder and Coningham because it would be 

fought in a terrain totally different from that of the desert. A land only slightly smaller than 

England, Tunisia is full of forests and hills, with torrential, freezing cold rainstorms in winter,

which had set in with a vengeance by December 1942. Tunisia is easy to defend against land

attacks, demanding significantly different methods of making war (from those that had served 

both sides so well in the broad deserts stretching eastward to the Nile). 

The war’s first supreme commander, the American general Dwight D. Eisenhower, now

made his appearance. His appointment reflected a massive, ever-growing American presence in 

men as well as material, and it greatly increased the importance of Washington as a center of 

opinion for RAF commanders to consider. Also in Tunisia, unlike in the desert, planners had 

numerous civilian noncombatants, many of them French subjects, to consider, placate, or oppose. 

And not least of the problems encountered was a marked contrast between battle-hardened 

veterans coming from bitter conflict in the desert and inexperienced soldiers and airmen coming 

from training camps in the United States and Great Britain. 

After a slow start in the Tunisian campaign, however, as in the desert campaigns, the Allies

would enjoy command of the sea and air. They would also have an enormous advantage on land 

in numbers of troops, tanks, guns, and supplies of all kinds, especially fuel. In addition, they 

continued to receive a steady stream of detailed, accurate information about enemy plans, 

strength, and supply arrangements from the code breakers in England who intercepted and 

deciphered Germany’s signals traffic-even the most secret. Hard though the fighting was in 

Tunisia, the Allies were never in serious danger of defeat (as opposed to embarrassing setbacks).

They had time to decide not only grand strategy for the rest of the war in lengthy conferences at

Casablanca but also to consider how best to improve their methods of fighting. The Tunisian 

campaign proved to be an ideal training ground where earlier mistakes in Anglo-FrancoAmerican relations and army-air cooperation could be identified and remedied. The Allies had 

complete confidence that ultimate victory was theirs. The campaign set a seal of approval upon

16
the sensible methods of Tedder and Coningham, confirming their reputations and ensuring that 

they would enjoy high command for the rest of the war. 

When Operation Torch began, airpower was neither independent nor centralized because

senior army officers, both British and American, insisted on controlling their own airpower to

provide local protection and deal with local problems. No American army had air-ground 

training before leaving the United States, and the plight of the British First Army was as bad 

(with less reason, for no notice had been taken of the combat-proven air support systems worked 

out in the desert). Gen William W. Momyer, commander of the American 33d Fighter Group at 

the time, recalled in 1982 his early unhappiness at the misuse of Allied airpower. His fighter

group was committed almost exclusively to flying “umbrella patrols” over the front line, leaving

the Luftwaffe free to hammer Allied airfields undisturbed while Allied bombers attacked targets 

as far away as Sicily and Italy. Coningham, he said, was the man who “brought the thing 

together”; he was “probably the most knowledgeable British officer on tactical air operations, as 

a result of his experience in the Western Desert.” 46 

At a meeting in Casablanca, President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill approved a 

new air organization on 26 January 1943. Tedder was to be the air commander for the entire 

Mediterranean region from his headquarters in Algiers, subordinate only to Eisenhower. Under 

Tedder would serve Lt Gen Carl A. Spaatz as air commander, Northwest Africa (with RAF 

officers Keith Park and Sholto Douglas commanding in Malta and Cairo). Three subcommands 

would be under Spaatz: Maj Gen James H. Doolittle would control heavy and medium bombers 

with their fighter escorts; Air Vice Marshal Hugh Pughe Lloyd would control general 

reconnaissance and fighters defending shipping and ports; and Coningham would specialize in 

air support for ground forces. Spaatz would have supply, maintenance, and repair resources 

under his direct control. 

Coningham would share an advanced headquarters with Eisenhower’s deputy, General 

Alexander, who commanded the operations of all three Allied armies in Tunisia. To each army

was attached an air force whose commander was subordinate to Coningham and who directed his 

force in consultation with the army commander. Knighted in November and promoted to the 

rank of air marshal in January, Coningham “was the logical person to head the tactical air 

command” in the opinion of Lt Gen Elwood R. “Pete” Quesada, then a combat pilot in Tunisia. 

“There was just no doubt about it. We didn’t have anybody that could even come close to him. 

..his was the easiest of all the selections that had to be made.” 47 

This organization resulted from weeks of negotiation in the most difficult circumstances. A 

new and thus far unsuccessful campaign was being fought in the depths of a cold, wet winter in 

an unknown country by forces hurriedly brought together under commanders not known to their 

men or to each other. Airfields were few and inadequate, and no semblance of a combined 

headquarters existed. Communications were practically nonexistent, except for an archaic 

telephone system, and the political situation, even from the perspective afforded by half a

century of hindsight, defies cogent summary. But none of these grave problems actually 

generated the fiercest tension in Northwest Africa. That came when the western “torch bearers,” 

struggling in trackless mud and acutely aware of their lack of success and heavy casualties at the 

hands of more battle-wise opponents, came face-to-face with the eastern “desert heroes” who had 

survived a prolonged and now clearly victorious campaign over those same opponents. The 

temptation for resentment on the one hand and condescension on the other was great and, 

because Homo sapiens is such a flawed creature, that temptation was enthusiastically indulged in 

many quarters. 

17
Luckily, those who framed the new organization during that cheerless winter were men of 

superior caliber. Most served together for the rest of this war, and some helped fight the cold war 

which followed. Tragedy also played a part in strengthening bonds between Tedder, Coningham,

and their American colleagues. Early in January 1943, Tedder’s wife was killed in an aircraft 

accident while returning to Cairo from a visit to RAF hospitals and welfare centers in Cyrenaica.

His eldest son, an RAF pilot, had already been killed on active service in August 1940. As for

Coningham, both of his stepsons were serving and one would be killed in September 1944. Such 

matters ought not, perhaps, to affect decision making, but in fact they do. Eisenhower himself

would be best man at Tedder’s second marriage in October and, later, a conscientious godfather 

to the son of that marriage. 

Air Commander Tedder 

“For our money,” recalled American major general Gordon P. Saville, “there had to be a 

British Air Commander. All of us air people would have been glad to work under anyone 

sponsoring the British system of airpower, regardless of who the individual was. Imagine our 

collective gratification when the guy who we’d been glad to take on as a matter of principle 

turned out to be a guy who could actually tie things up. Tedder was the man who kept airpower 

as airpower. And Eisenhower was prepared to be sold on that, by a man like him.” Eisenhower 

certainly valued Tedder’s ability and quickly warned to his personality. “Neither he nor I were 

impressed with bluster,” commented Eisenhower. “Tedder agreed that if prestige was to depend 

on pomp and flags and bad temper, then it was just too bad. And he believed in tact, whereas 

some of us were inclined to think that tact was to be despised. Of course, tact, to be true tact, 

isn’t apparent. Tedder disguised most of his under cover of gentle sarcasm.” Doolittle was less 

easily convinced. “At the time, in consummate selfishness and egotism, I felt that the 

appointment of Tedder was unnecessary, but it worked so fairly that there was no question as to 

its wisdom, which I very soon recognized.” 48 

Eisenhower and his chief of staff (Maj Gen Walter Bedell Smith) loyally supported the new

organization although they were, in Tedder’s opinion, “instinctively antagonistic to it and find it

difficult to understand that every General has not a divine right to command his own private air 

forces, and incidentally a divine inspiration by which he knows better than anyone else how 

those air forces should be employed.” Bedell Smith told Tedder that he would do all he could to 

make the system work, but it did not affect his opposition to a separate US air force after the war, 

which would come only “over his dead body.” 49 He would have been unimpressed by General 

Adler’s assertion at a Washington press conference in March 1943 that Tedder had 

“demonstrated beyond peradventure of doubt that even though the RAF is an independent 

organization, it can support a ground army in battle.” 50

Tedder had spoken to a group of American and British officers in Spaatz’s villa in February

1943, expressing the hope that the new structure would also serve for the much greater challenge 

of liberating France and the rest of occupied Europe. We are proud of our own air forces, he said, 

and content with our own methods, but “it will be the fusion of us, the British, with you, the 

Americans, that is going to make the very best Air Force in the world.” Tedder then promised 

never again to speak of us British or you Americans. “From now on it is ‘we’ together who will 

function as Allies, even better than either of us alone.” 51 These words were particularly welcome 

because Spaatz and his staff (including RAF officers) had recently heard Churchill over BBC 

radio announce the new structure without mentioning a single American officer. Tedder shared 

18
Eisenhower’s famous enthusiasm for Allied principles, but some of their political masters and 

military colleagues, as well as some journalists and radio broadcasters on both sides of the 

Atlantic, deliberately soured Anglo-American relations. From time to time, Churchill and the

BBC inadvertently exacerbated the harm by thoughtless flag-waving. 52

Air Marshal Arthur Tedder 

As commander In chief of the Middle East Air Command, Tedder 

oversaw a successful air campaign in North Africa from June 1941 to 

May 1943. (Source: US Air Force)

Neither Tedder nor Spaatz allowed themselves to be swamped by administrative detail or to 

become prisoners of their staffs. They got out and about, lightly attended, to see- for themselves. 

Though very much in command, they had an informal manner and wasted no time on spit or 

polish. They kept temperatures down, refusing to fuss or get visibly excited. Like Spaatz, Tedder 

had a dry wit that appealed to many Americans, among them Harry Butcher, Eisenhower’s naval 

aide, who felt the edge of it one day when Tedder said to him: “Butch, if General Ike ever gives 

you up as his aide, I just want you to know that I don’t want you either.” 53 The informality was 

necessary, certainly with regard to paperwork, because British and American staff methods were 

so different. Professor Solly Zuckerman, Tedder’s chief scientific officer, observed that neither

19
Tedder nor Spaatz spoke at meetings unless they had something to say. Although Tedder did not 

share Spaatz’s passion for poker or whiskey and was much less gregarious, their real differences

lay in their attitudes toward the war. Spaatz saw it ‘‘as an opportunity to show what ‘the Air’ 

could do; Tedder saw it in its historical perspective, not obsessed about the place of ‘the Air’ in 

Britain’s military establishment.” Zuckerman might have said, but did not, that Tedder was a 

member of a service long independent and could well afford his relaxed attitude; Spaatz’s 

situation was quite different. 54 

Unfortunately, Tedder’s relaxed attitude changed when he learned on 2 April 1943 of a

public quarrel between Coningham and Maj Gen George S. Patton Jr. (newly appointed

commander of II Corps). As he saw it, the quarrel threatened “a major crisis in Anglo-American 

relations.” 55 As every account of the Tunisian campaign notes (more or less accurately), Patton 

added an intemperate comment to a routine situation report and gave it a wider distribution than 

normal. “Forward troops have been continuously bombed all morning,” he claimed. “Total lack 

of air cover for our units has allowed German Air Forces to operate almost at will.” Brig Gen

Laurence S. Kuter, knowing Patton, was unimpressed; so, too, were General Alexander and Maj 

Gen Omar N. Bradley (soon to take over II Corps). The signal was “so obviously exaggerated 

and emotional” that Kuter doubted if anyone would take it seriously. 56 

But Coningham did. It caught him on the raw, and he made his own intemperate, widely 

distributed response. Tedder, also caught on the raw, made Coningham withdraw his signal and 

apologize in person to Patton. Tedder was exceedingly anxious about any public threat to AngloAmerican harmony and claimed in his memoirs that only his prompt actions prevented the 

supreme commander from resigning. It is certainly true that Eisenhower shared Tedder’s anxiety, 

but it was in fact Spaatz who settled the affair by pointing out that Coningham had actually 

defended his American subordinates (XII Air Support Command) against unjust criticism and 

convinced Eisenhower that Patton was mostly to blame. 57 

The episode shows how determined Tedder was to maintain good Anglo-American 

relations-and Coningham certainly got the message: “getting together” included staying together, 

regardless of the rights or wrongs of particular issues, and there must be no public quarreling. On 

5 April Coningham addressed a long (and in places, groveling) account of the affair to Air Vice 

Marshal Philip Wigglesworth, Tedder’s chief of staff in Algiers. “The Chief reproved me for my

signal,” he admitted, “and I think he was quite right because it does not help to throw grit in the 

works and no individual must be allowed to upset the machine. ...If you have the opportunity, 

would you kindly convey this aspect of the incident to General Eisenhower with my sincere 

regrets?” What weighed most with Tedder, as he confided to Portal on 17 April, was the 

“repeated failure” of American troops to carry out offensives successfully. This was “an 

unfortunate fact,” and Eisenhower was “very concerned that this situation may be distorted and 

developed by Hearst Press to support a campaign for confining American military effort to 

Pacific theater. We shall have to be careful to avoid over-stressing British contribution to present 

campaign.” 58 

Several air force officers commented on Tedder when interviewed in the Pentagon after their 

return from duty in North Africa. Their comments are especially valuable because the interviews

were unpublished-no question of buttering up an ally arises. Maj Frederick S. Wildman, for

example, was interviewed on 5 April 1943. He had met Tedder in Algiers and admired his 

“warmth, his simplicity and, above all, his direct objective thinking and plain common sense.” 

Tedder had “no artificial dignity and could as easily be a fine character out of New England or

Texas as out of Great Britain. I am convinced he will get along well with us and we with him.” 

20
Lt Col C. V. Whitney agreed. He had worked with Tedder for nine months and admired his 

courage in standing up to army commanders. He imbibed Tedder’s principles for the 

employment of airpower, which may be summarized as follows: independent command of the air 

force; adjacent army and air headquarters, with nightly joint meetings; intelligence and 

operations officers working side by side; all units mobile; radar installed at every airfield to 

prevent fighters, the “basic weapon” of an air force, from being caught on the ground; and rapid 

communication available between air headquarters and unit commanders. 59 

On 24 May 1943, after victory had been achieved in Tunisia, Spaatz sent his thoughts on the 

structure created in February to General Arnold. It had “served its purpose,” he grudgingly 

admitted, but in his opinion it was “too dependent on personalities to be sound as a permanent

setup. Channels of control, basic allegiance, and differences in national aims are all elements 

which crop up from time to time. There is no doubt but that we have acquired much benefit from 

this intimate association with the RAF. This is particularly true in connection with fighter 

operations, air-shipping operations, administrative planning, and intelligence. I believe, however, 

that they have learned as much from us in the strategic application of air power.” As for relations 

with the Army, Spaatz told Arnold that if it were not for “the disturbance which would ensue, I 

would probably announce the urgent necessity of a separate Air Force.” 60

Two years later, on 20 May 1945, after victory had been achieved in Europe, Spaatz was of

a different opinion about the dependence on personalities. The organization adopted for 

Operation Overlord, he told historian Dr. Bruce C. Hopper, “wasn’t necessary. Provided they had 

put into effect the same organization up here that they had in the Mediterranean.” Spaatz had 

discussed this with Eisenhower and Tedder. “I told them then that the thing to do was to organize 

on the same basis that we did down in Africa, and that I would accept Tedder as the Air 

Commander, and go under him as Deputy in Command of the American Air Forces.”

Unfortunately, this was not done. “Eisenhower, Tedder and myself kept in such close touch with 

ourselves that nothing could possibly go wrong, except in our own persons. ...It worked well 

enough to win the war, yes, but if one of the three had been struck by heart failure it might have 

worked so poorly as to lose the war. ...In other words, it was a lousy organization.” Interviewed 

again by Hopper on 27 June 1945, Spaatz repeated his point: “I suggested that we organize here 

exactly as we organized in the Mediterranean. ... That was never done. ...don’t know what the 

stumbling block was-it may have been [Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur] Harris [head of RAF 

Bomber Command]. ...Perhaps Harris had been built up too strong to be placed under the 

command of Tedder. ...We felt that all Air Forces must be tied in with the operation of the 

ground forces, all being considered as one problem. That was based on our experience down in 

the Mediterranean.” By the end of the war, then, Spaatz agreed with Tedder that personalities

mattered more than structures. 61 

After the war, two famous American air generals emphasized Tedder’s management skills. 

“Even when persuading you,” recalled Pete Quesada, “he seldom worked on the actual point. He 

tried to influence people’s minds and have them think straight rather than order their actions.”

Larry Kuter added, “His manner of operating was one of getting conflicting interests together

and staying very much in the background.” Somehow, the decisions that emerged were usually 

the ones he wanted. 62 However, Tedder was much more than an adroit operator. He had a vision 

of war “as a single problem in which the strategy, the tactics, and the technique of sea, land and 

air warfare respectively are inevitably and closely interlocked.” 63 “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,” a machine capable of pulling its weight in the largest and 

21
most successful military collaboration in history. This vision, formulated in the Mediterranean, 

admirably fitted that of Eisenhower. 64 

As for Coningham, he played a full part in creating this vision, despite his quarrel with 

Patton. For instance, he had greatly impressed Brig Gen Howard A. Craig, a distinguished 

USAAF staff officer, who recorded in December 1942 Coningham’s startling opinion that army

and air commanders should enjoy equal status, and his even more startling statement that direct 

support from the air had played only a minor part in the desert conflict. In fact, claimed 

Coningham (with an exaggeration doubtless calculated to impress Craig still further, and through 

him, Spaatz), the army had actually been in support of the air effort by capturing essential 

landing grounds, preparing new ones, and transporting and protecting supplies, because “the

Army cannot advance without fighters and the fighters cannot move without petrol.” 65 

Until February 1943, when Coningham arrived in Tunisia, another American officer 

(General Kuter) had been put in charge of something called Allied Air Support Command. 

“Since all ground officers are expert Air Chief Marshals,” wrote Kuter on January 26, “my job is 

to keep ground forces from swallowing the air forces, to keep RAF from swallowing AAF, etc. 

Nice bunch of cannibals in Africa! And Casablanca. And London. And Washington.” 

Coningham and Kuter became good friends, but not at first sight. Kuter thought him “a big, selfconfident, forceful and clearly ambitious fellow”; but he came to admire Coningham’s style, 

respected his record, and (more to the point) became convinced that his methods worked and 

would help along the cause of independence for the US Air Force. Coningham, of course, 

refused to be an air support commander, and Kuter foresaw that Spaatz would have a tough time

“between the charming Tedder and the bellicose Coningham.” 66 

As Spaatz wrote to Maj Gen George E. Stratemeyer (chief of Air Staff in Washington) on 8 

February, it was hard to treat aviation as “coequal with the Army and Navy in our [American] 

setup, whereas the RAF will not submit to it being considered in any other way.” The RAF

would not accept that air support “belongs” to an army commander or that an army commander 

could dictate its employment. Spaatz was quite right, and at the end of that same month Portal 

would emphasize the same point in a letter to Churchill. He told the prime minister that the

failures in Tunisia before the desert commanders arrived had been exacerbated by British and 

American generals insisting that airpower belonged to them and that it should be divided into 

what he called “penny packets”; that is, numerous small formations of aircraft circling over 

frontline troops as defensive umbrellas against dive-bomber attacks in particular. Kuter would 

later recall that Patton refused to camouflage his command post and, when it was strafed,

demanded an umbrella from dawn to dusk, even if this meant no offensive operations could be 

flown. According to Kuter, American troops were instructed to abandon light flak weapons and 

take cover whenever Stukas appeared. These dive-bombers were regarded as invincible and 

deadly by men who had seen too many newsreels. 67 Alarmed by such nonsense, Coningham 

went to Tripoli on 16 February “to put a little air sense into the mob of Generals there,” as Air 

Vice Marshal James Robb (Spaatz’s British chief of staff) noted in his diary. Coningham’s 

address to senior American as well as British officers in Tripoli made an uncommon stir, to 

judge by the number of copies surviving in Anglo-American archives. This address, and a 

subsequent directive to his subordinate commanders, summarized principles of lasting value 

formulated-or collected or remembered-by Tedder, Coningham, and others close to them. These

precepts were incorporated into a pamphlet approved by the Air Ministry, Arnold, and 

Montgomery, who had them widely circulated throughout the British army as Montgomery’s 

own views. 68 These principles may be considered under four headings. First, that the army and 

22
air commanders must act together in accordance with a combined plan, the whole operation to be

directed by the army commander. Second, that the fighter governed the front, and this fact 

required the centralization of airpower in the hands of an airman to exploit its flexibility. For

instance, fighters must not be used as local umbrellas over a static front because this would leave 

the Luftwaffe free to bomb and strafe airfields, rear areas, and supply lines. Third, that air 

superiority must be sought-and continually maintained-both to permit the orderly concentration

of friendly forces and their buildup of supplies, and to impede that orderly concentration and 

buildup by enemy forces. If enemy movement could be restricted to the hours of darkness, 

unescorted bombing (by a force too small and vulnerable to risk unescorted in daylight) would 

become possible. And fourth, that the battlefield be isolated, as far as possible, by destroying 

access to it-whether by road, bridge, railway, river, canal, or port-for troops or supplies. 

Air Vice Marshal Arthur Coningham 

Coningham prepares to visit his forward units in the Western Desert. (Source: 

Sarah Braxton Coningham Whittaker, Coningham’s granddaughter) 

Coningham did not specify what degree, if any. of close air support the soldier could expect. 

Sir Kenneth Cross, head of 242 Group in Tunisia, has written that soldiers urged him to “keep 

23
the enemy air off our backs, that’s all we ask; we can cope with the rest.” Until near the end of 

the Tunisian campaign, it was the most that could be attempted. It was also, as Cross observed, 

wishful thinking on the soldiers’ part, given the expertise of their German opponents; man for

man, Allied soldiers were usually outmatched. 69 Consequently, as Allied airpower increased and 

enemy airpower declined, “protecting backs” would be regarded as the very least that should be 

done. During Overlord, airpower would frequently be expected to substitute for ground action. 

To do so, it would need specially designed and equipped fighter-bombers as well as more rapid 

and accurate communications systems between air and ground units than those that were 

available in either the desert or Tunisia. 

The good effect of Coningham’s Tripoli speech was increased by Air Marshal Sir Trafford 

Leigh-Mallory’s visit to Tunisia in March and April 1943. As head of RAF Fighter Command in 

Britain, Leigh-Mallory went there to study the air structure with future operations across the 

Channel in mind. His report to Portal, warmly commending the organization of Coningham’s

command as excellent both in operations and in fostering good relations with other services, 

British and American, was well received. It led in June 1943 to the Air Ministry’s revamping of

the Army Cooperation Command into the Second Tactical Air Force (Coningham’s being the 

First Tactical Air Force). To obtain that command, once a Channel crossing emerged as a 

realistic prospect, would become Coningham’s ambition. 70 

General Kuter took with him to Washington on 13 May 1943, a report that was in fact an 

indictment of the handling of airpower during the Tunisian campaign before the restructuring of

February. The indictment fell on more fertile soil than Kuter cared (then or later) to admit, since 

Spaatz had naturally kept Arnold fully informed about all operations. Until then, American 

doctrine had been expressed in Field Manual (FM) 31-35, which cast aviation in a defensive role,

with the neutralization of enemy airpower a secondary task. For example, the manual did not 

even mention airfields among suitable targets for air strikes. This doctrine ran counter to what air

officers had been learning at the Air Corps Tactical School, where “the faculty preached unity of 

command and concentration of forces for offensive action to attain that first priority, air

superiority.” 71 Although Coningham was therefore preaching to many converts in Tunisia, he

was supporting what they believed from personal experience backed by the prestige of success. 

Kuter helped to get a new manual written (FM 100-20) which formally became US War

Department policy on 21 July 1943. As General Momyer has written, that manual is “the 

emancipation proclamation” of tactical airpower in the United States. Like other such 

proclamations, it has meant different things at different times, not all of them intended by its 

authors, and it affords ample scope for study. 72 Communications links and procedures for setting 

priorities in answering calls for air support had still to be worked out, but the doctrine made 

possible, in the words of an official historian, John E. Fagg, “one of the most effective

collaborations known to military history.” 73 

That doctrine was perhaps less important than the fact that Tedder and Coningham did “get 

together” with Americans as well as with the British army. A mutual respect ripened in many 

cases into friendships of an intensity unique to those who have served together under fire: an 

intensity deepened by the fact that these RAF officers and their American companions tasted the

joy, however briefly, of absolute victory, earned after years of joint struggle, over one of the

most powerful and criminal regimes ever to have infested this planet. Only in the final stages of

their collaboration, however, did air superiority become air supremacy, as the valiant Luftwaffe

ran out of pilots and petrol. Given supremacy, as in the recent Desert Storm operation, aircraft

can carry out accurate bombing of the battlefield, supply lines, and access routes, and do these 

24
around the clock, to prevent enemy sleep as well as movement. But close air support remains as

dangerous as ever, even from what one Desert Storm pilot called a “prehistoric” curtain of

cannon and tracer put up by Iraqi flak batteries. “I never imagined there could be that much 

ground fire,” said another pilot. 74 Veterans of earlier desert storms, who faced flak that was just

as frightening in BE-2cs or Kittyhawks, and who now hog the bar in that great mess in the sky, 

will have smiled to hear such words before turning to ask, respectfully, of course, what Tedder 

and Coningham think of modern tactics. 

Allied Leaders in North Africa 

From left: Air Vice Marshal Harry Broadhurst (commander of Western Desert 

Air Forces after February 1943); Air Vice Marshal Arthur Coningham; Gen Sir 

Bernard Montgomery; Gen Sir Harold Alexander; Air Marshal Sir Arthur 

Tedder; Brig Gen Laurence S. Kuter. (Source: Mrs. L. S. Kuter’s collection) 

Eisenhower was often accused by his fellow countrymen of being Britain’s best general, and 

Tedder might well be dubbed America’s best air marshal. During the war, Tedder weakened an 

American conviction that Britons were publicly patronizing and privately insulting. After the

war, aided by Russian aggression, he modified the conviction long inculcated at Army and Navy 

War Colleges that Britons were rivals. 75 To get a friend, he knew, you have to be one, and 

Walter Bedell Smith (not a man to annoy, regardless of where you were born, or a man who

wore his heart on his sleeve, either) told Tedder in July 1945: “I feel closer to men like you. 

..than I have ever been to friends that I have known all my life. ...Give my love to Toppy 

[Tedder’s wife]. Both you and she will always be at home wherever I am.” 76

25
Notes 

1

 Equivalent in rank to a lieutenant general. 

2

 B. H. Liddell Hart to Cassell & Co., Ltd., letter, 26 April 1966, King’s College, London, 

Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, Liddell Hart Correspondence, 1/339/20. 

3

 Samuel Johnson, in The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia, chap. 26, quoted in 

James Boswell, Boswell’s life of Johnson (London: Oxford University Press, 1946), 15 April 

1778: “I am willing to love all mankind, except an American.” This was one Johnsonian dictum

that Tedder, of course, ignored. 

4

 Lord Arthur William Tedder, With Prejudice: The War Memoirs of Marshal of the Royal 

Air Force Lord Tedder, GCB (London: Cassell, 1966), 32. 

5

 Marylin Bender and Selig Altschul, The Chosen Instrument: Pan AM, Juan Trippe. The 

Rise and Fall of an American Entrepreneur (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1982), 10-15, 362-

72; Edward T. Purcell, “African Airline: A Study of Pan American Airways’ Operations in 

Africa, 1941-1942” (master’s thesis, Columbia University, April 1946), 12; Tedder, 156-58, 222-

24. 

6

 Brig Gen Elmer E. Adler, US Military North African Mission, Cairo, to Brig Gen H. J. F. 

Miller, HQ Service Command, Wright Field, Dayton, Ohio, letter, 29 November 1941, Bolling 

Air Force Base (AFB), Washington, D.C., in Microfilm A.17 48. 

7

 Tedder, 158-62, 209-10: Maj Gen George H. Brett to Gen Henry H. Arnold, letter, 22 

September 1941, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., Arnold Papers, box 41. “The British

are in a very tight spot and unless somebody wakes up to the situation they’re sure as the 

mischief going to get caught. To sum up, if Russia cannot tie the German air force to the ground 

during the winter by offensive action, Hitler can concentrate a tremendous mass in Crete and

lower Greece, A mass of air concentrated at this point can practically make Cairo untenable; 

furthermore the Egyptians are neutral and any amount of bombing of Cairo will undoubtedly 

cause a reaction which may eventually force the English [sic] to evacuate, ...I may be a little 

pessimistic but from Germany’s angle it appears to me a terrifically simple problem compared to 

that confronted by the British.” 

8

 Tedder, 156-58. 222-24; Brig Gen Robert Olds, Head, USMC Ferrying Command. 

Washington. D.C., to Brig Gen Elmer E. Adler, U.S. Military North African Mission, Cairo, 

letter, 14 February 1942, Bolling AFB, Washington. D.C., Microfilm A. 1748. 

9

 Roderic Owen, Tedder (London: Collins, 1952), 165-67; Tedder, 354-55.

10 Owen, 166, 190; Tedder papers, author’s unpublished personal collection. 

11 Tedder papers 

12 Ibid; Tedder. 319. “It was not true,” added Churchill, “and I was not told the truth. I am 

sorry.” 

13 Field Marshal Sir Michael Carver, ed., The War Lords: Military Commanders of the

Twentieth Century (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1976),486-87. 

14 Denis Richards, Portal of Hungerford: Life of Marshal of the Royal Air Force, Viscount 

Portal of Hungerford, KG, GCB, OM, OSO, MC (London: Heinemann. 1977), 236 (Judas); 

Tedder, 184 (Brutus). 

15 Vincent Orange, Coningham: A Biography of Air Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham, KCB, 

KBE, OSO, MC, DFC, AFC (London: Methuen, 1990; Office of Air Force History, Washington, 

D.C., 1992), 18. Coningham was always known, to friends and enemies alike, as “Mary,” a 

26
Notes 

nickname probably derived from “Maori,” given him because he was a New Zealander, though 

he had no Maori blood. 

16 Tedder, 55. 

17 Tedder papers; Liddell Hart to Cassell & Co., letter, 26 April 1966. 

18 Orange, 667. 

19 Ibid., 78. 

20 Air Vice Marshal Raymond Collishaw with R. V. Dodds, Air Command: A Fighter Pilot’s

Story (London: William Kimber, 1973). 

21 Air Marshal Sir Peter Drummond, “The Air Campaign in Libya and Tripolitania,” RUSI 

Journal 88 (1943): 257. 

22 “RAF Narrative: The Middle East Campaigns” (London: Public Record Office (PRO), 

AIR 41/25, vol. 2, pt. 1, Collishaw, “Lessons Learnt in Western Desert,” 47; Roderic Owen, The

Desert Air Force (London; New York: Hutchinson, 1948; Arrow paperback edition, 1958), 17-

75; John Terraine, The Right of the Line: The Royal Air Force in the European War, 1939-1945 

(London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1985), 301-52 (the quotation appears on 304). 

23 Henry H. Arnold to Lord Arthur William Tedder, letter, 5 July 1943, Library of Congress.

Arnold Papers, box 47. 

24 Air Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham. “‘The Development of Tactical Air Forces.” RUSI 

Journal 91 (1946): 32 

25 Ibid., 213. 

26 Field Marshal Lord Carver, Twentieth Century Warriors (London: Weidenfeld and 

Nicolson, 1987), 313. 

27 Orange. 79. 

28 Ibid., 134. “Incidentally.” said Coningham in February 1943, “we here still do not 

understand why some of the Army and Air officers concerned in the planning of Torch did not 

visit the Western Desert and learn at least some of the simple lessons which 8th Army mastered 

over twelve months ago.” 

29 “RAF Narrative.” PRO, AIR 41/25, vol. 2, 568. 

30 Ibid., 59-62; Shelford Bidwell and Dominick Graham. FirePower: British Army Weapons 

and Theories of War 1904-1945 (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1982), 263-69: Richard G. 

Davis, Tempering the Blade: General Carl A. Spaatz and American Tactical Air Power in North 

Africa, November 8, 1942-May 14, 1943 (Washington. D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 1989), 

44-46. 

31 “RAF Narrative,” PRO, AIR 41/25, vol. 2, 99-103. 

32 Orange, 83. 

33 Air Marshal Sir Kenneth Hayr, “Logistics in the Gulf War.” RUSI Journal 136 (1991): 14, 

19. 

34 Orange, 89. 

35 Ibid., 90. 98. 

36 F. H. Hinsley et al.. British Intelligence in the Second World War: Its Influence on

Strategy and Operations, 3 vols. (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office [HMSO], 1979-87: 

also New York: Cambridge University Press, 1979-1990), vol. 2, 373-80, [Entire series.] 

27
Notes 

37 David Irving. The Trail of the Fox: The Life of Field-Marshal Erwin Rommel (London: 

Futura Publications, 1978), 182-83, 189, 201: Harold Faber, ed., Luftwaffe: An Analysis by

Former Luftwaffe Generals (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1979). 119-20. 

38 Orange, 100. 

39 Matthew Cooper, The German Air Force, 1933-1945: An Anatomy of Failure (London; 

New York: Jane’s. 1981), 209-10: Orange, 97. 

40 Orange, 93. 

41 Irving, 51, 174. 

42 Orange, 106. 

43 Nigel Hamilton, Monty: The Making of a General (1887-1942) (New York: McGrawHill, 1981), 601: Orange, 105. 

44 Book reviews, Sunday Times (London). 30 October 1983 (a review of books by Nigel 

Hamilton and Richard Lamb). 

45 Lt Gen Lewis H. Brereton, The Brereton Diaries: The War in the Air in the Pacific, 

Middle East and Europe, 3 October 1941-8 May 1945 (New York: W. Morrow and Company. 

1946) 167-68, 172: Orange, 117, 125-26. 

46 Richard H. Kohn and Joseph P. Harahan, eds., Air Superiority in World War II and Korea: 

An Interview with Gen. James Ferguson, Gen. Robert M. Lee, Gen. William Momyer, and Lt. 

Gen. Elwood R. Quesada (Washington. D.C.: Government Printing Office, Office of Air Force 

History, 1983), 30-31. 

47 Orange, 131. 

48 Owen, 191-92, 194-95. 

49 Tedder, 404-5. 

50 Brig Gen Elmer E. Adler, press conference, 25 March 1943, Bolling AFB. Washington, 

D.C., Microfilm, A.1748, 1-10. 

51 Tedder, 397-98. 

52 Spaatz Papers, Library of Congress, box 23, February 1943. 

53 Davis, 2: Harry C. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower: The Personal Diary of 

Captain Harry C. Butcher, USNR, Naval Aide to General Eisenhower. 1942-1945 (New York: 

Simon & Schuster, 1946), 343. 

54 Baron Solly Zuckerman, Six Men Out of the Ordinary (London: Peter Owen, 1992), 65-

66. 99. 

55 Tedder, 411. 

56 Orange, 146. 

57 Davis, 98-103. 

58 Orange, 149. 

59 Interviews with Maj Frederick S. Wildman and Lt Col C. V. Whitney, Bolling AFB, 

Washington, D.C., Microfilm A 1274. 

60 Spaatz Papers, Library of Congress, box 11. 

61 Ibid., box 136. 

62 Owen, 207, 216: Gen Laurence S. Kuter, interviewed by Thomas A. Sturm and Hugh N. 

Ahmann, September-October 1974, Bolling AFB, Washington. D.C., K239.0512-810. 

28
Notes 

63 Marshal of the Royal Air Force (MRAF) Lord Arthur Tedder, Air Power in War (The

Lees Knowles Lectures, a series of four lectures delivered at Cambridge University, FebruaryMarch 1947] (London: Air Ministry, September 1947), 11. 

64 MRAF Lord Tedder, “Air, Land and Sea Warfare,” RUSI Journal 91 (1946), 64. 

65 Orange, 124, 126. 

66 Ibid., 131. 

67 Ibid., 131-33, 139-40. 

68 Ibid., 133-34. 

69 Sir Kenneth Cross to author, private communication, 17 June 1988. 

70 Orange, 149-51. 

71 Davis, 107-117; I. B. Holley Jr., “Land/Air Operations in North West Africa,” RAF 

Historical Journal 9, 49, 52. 

72 Maj John Patrick Owens, “The Evolution of FM 100-20, Command and Employment of 

Air Power (21 July 1943): The Foundation of Modern Airpower Doctrine” (master’s thesis, Fort 

Leavenworth, Kans., 1989). 

73 Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Cate, eds., The Army Air Forces in World War II, 7

vols. (1948-1958; new imprint, Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 1983), vol. 3, 

807. 

74 J. M. Ramsden, “Gulf Air War,” Aerospace 18, no. 3 (March 1991): 4. 

75 John Gooch, “‘Hidden in the Rock’: American Military Perceptions of Great Britain, 

1919-1940,” in War. Strategy, and International Politics: Essays in Honor of Sir Michael 

Howard, ed. Lawrence Freedman et al. (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, Clarendon 

Press, 1992), 172-73. 

76 Ibid. 

29
A Glider in the Propwash 

of the Royal Air Force? 

Gen Carl A. Spaatz, the RAF, and the 

Foundations of American Tactical Air Doctrine 

David R. Mets 

Since well before John Quincy Adams pronounced on 7 November 1823, “It would be more

candid as well as more dignified, to avow our principles explicitly to Russia and France, than to 

come in as a cock-boat in the wake of the British man-of-war,” Americans have often been 

concerned lest they appear the junior partner in a long string of common enterprises with the

British. 1

 One of the more recent experiences had to do with the origins of US Air Force (USAF) 

tactical air doctrine in the World War II campaign in North Africa, the 50th anniversary of which 

has recently reached us. A common image over the last 50 years has been that an infant US air

arm stumbled into the big leagues against Erwin Rommel, with no clue as to the rules of the 

game. The image also contains the notion that US Army airmen quickly showed their ignorance 

until the RAF came to their rescue with a proper doctrine and leadership. 2

 

My purpose is to revisit this issue, seeking additional insights arising from a considerable

new literature on the North African air campaign. Just what was it that the RAF taught the 

Americans? Which of the Americans needed teaching? What was the role of Gen Carl A. Spaatz,

the senior American airman involved in the process? Is the standard interpretation of the RAF's 

contribution to the campaign in Tunisia and the genesis of American tactical air doctrine subject 

to readjustment? 

The working hypothesis for this essay, then, can be expressed thusly: The set of ideas that 

constituted the framework for the US tactical air doctrine as expressed in Field Manual (FM) 

100-20, Command and Employment of Air Power, and all subsequent USAF doctrinal manuals 

is often thought to be of British origin. However, documentation regarding the US Army Air

Service in World War I and the Air Corps in the interwar period reveals that the main ideas

already existed in the minds of many American airmen long before the beginning of the African 

campaign. Air Marshal Coningham and Field Marshal Montgomery probably did more to help 

American airmen sell their concepts to US soldiers than they did to teach Americans how to 

organize for and conduct an air war. Previously, US airmen had made only a little progress in 

persuading their fellow Army men. The combination of the great prestige of El Alamein and the 

great disappointments of the Battle of Kasserine Pass enabled the British to help the airmen gain

a little in their effort. The air situation did improve in the aftermath of Kasserine, but that was 

due to many other factors in addition to the ideas and leadership the desert veterans brought to 

North Africa. General Spaatz's role in all of this was more as a diplomat than as a student of 

airpower doctrine. He served largely to facilitate cooperation between air and ground, and 

between the Americans and the British. He already understood most of the tactical air ideas 

involved when he came to Africa. 

30
In assessing the literature on the North African campaign, I found it more extensive than I 

had suspected-and it continues to grow. For this work, I have explored some of the major printed 

secondary and primary sources to establish a historiographic framework. I have confined most of 

my research in the unpublished primary sources to those having to do with Gen Carl A. Spaatz 

and his role in the North African campaign. In so doing, I was seeking a divergence (if any) 

between the most common historical views and the tentative image that would seem to emerge 

from the unpublished sources consulted. 

The Conventional Image 

Notwithstanding all the enthusiasm expressed by senior airmen that the publication of FM

100-20 had solved the doctrinal problems, contrary views on the solutions and on the origins of

the ideas have persisted to the present day. Col Robert H. Scales Jr., an American artillery 

officer, wrote in 1990: 

The doctrinal struggle between these two factions [Army Air Forces and Army Ground Forces]

effectively halted progress toward a system of close air support until the opening campaign in

North Africa when the Luftwaffe provided a painful lesson on how it was done. At the Battle of

Kasserine Pass, American units were badly mauled by an air-armour team perfected in Poland.

France and North African. Stuka dive bombers, designed specifically for ground support, 

continually bombed and strafed American defensive positions. There was little evidence of Allied 

airpower. ...After the disastrous opening campaign in the Northern Desert, a British air officer. Air 

Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham, instituted a system of control of Allied tactical airpower by

grafting to the out-of-date American doctrine a system established and proven by the British

Eighth Army in North African. Coningham preached that communications was the key to 

successful air-ground operations. He insisted that air and ground field headquarters be located

together and demanded that effective liaison be established between them from Army Group down

to division, following the British example. 

3

 

Colonel Scales garbled just what the substance of the British doctrine was supposed to have

been. The message was much more akin to what the US Army Air Corps had been preaching 

ever since the days of Billy Mitchell than it was to anything proposed by the Army ground 

forces. The essence was centralized command of air forces by air commanders at the theater

level, a concept quite at odds with the ideas of many American ground force commanders (then 

and today) and those of even the British First Army in Tunisia. Almost as important in the

doctrine that the British were alleged to have transported to Tunis from Cairo was preference for 

the offensive use of airpower, again quite at odds with the preferences of soldiers of both the 

British First Army and the US II Corps in central Tunisia. Finally, the priority of missions was

an issue. All concerned understood that air superiority came first, but Coningham favored rear 

area attacks rather than battlefield strikes within the range of friendly artillery- again, a message 

that Carl Spaatz had been urging on the ground and air commanders in North Africa well before

Coningham and Tedder took command. 4

 

The sets of ideas most prominent in both the British documents and the US Army FM 100-

20 published in the wake of the African campaign are strikingly similar: Tactical airpower must 

be centrally controlled at the theater level. It must be commanded by an airman who is colocated 

with and coequal to the theater commander. Its first mission is to achieve and maintain air

superiority. The second priority is to execute operations against enemy forces away from the 

battlefield, in his rear areas. Attacks against battlefield targets must be the exception and are to

be avoided anywhere within range of friendly artillery. 5

 

31
The Problem with Torch 

The picture we have of the impact of Torch on USAF doctrinal development may be

somewhat skewed by the press of events in traumatic times and by the garbling of the sequence 

of events. Recall that the original plan called for three landings. The westernmost one, near 

Casablanca, was commanded by George Patton and deployed directly from Norfolk, Virginia, to 

the African shore. The concept was that it and its accompanying air forces would protect the 

Allied line of communications against a possible Nazi or Spanish thrust southward from the 

Iberian Peninsula across the Straits of Gibraltar. It was envisioned that the air element would set 

up at a series of airfields along the southern border of Spanish Morocco in an air defense mode. 

These airfields were indeed established and kept operational until the end of the North African 

campaign. Patton's ground troops were not envisioned as the striking arm destined to attack 

Tunisia and close off Rommel's route of escape. Neither the ground forces nor the air forces had 

had much in the way of air-ground training. The 33d Fighter Group, which landed at Port 

Lyautey, for example, had been trained for the air defense of the northeastern United States. 6

 

The center force (the one landing at Oran) and the eastern most force (the one headed for

Algiers) were both largely British with token American forces included so as to disarm French 

hostility. The easternmost force was the one designated to do the damage to the Germans. The 

idea was that as soon as the landings were secure, Eisenhower would thrust that force eastward 

in the hope of beating Rommel to Tunis and Bizerte, trapping him between Torch and the British 

Eighth Army that was following him from El Alamein toward Tripoli. The easternmost force 

was the British First Army commanded by Lt Gen Sir Kenneth Anderson. 

In the planning, First Army was to be supported by the RAF 242 Group commanded by Air 

Marshal Sir William Welsh. In the plan, neither Patton's ground units nor those under Maj Gen 

Lloyd Fredendall, which had deployed from the United Kingdom with the Oran force, were 

envisioned as part of the group that would dash to Tunis and Bizerte to close off Rommel's

retreat. Still less seen as having major roles in Tunisia were the XII Air Support Command with

Patton and the XII Fighter and Bomber Commands deploying from the United Kingdom. The

operations were concluded in Morocco and Algeria more rapidly than the worst-case predictions, 

and the main fighting occurred when Anderson's forces arrived in the vicinity of the Tunisian 

ports. 

When the Germans concluded that indeed North Africa was the target of Torch, they quickly 

anticipated the thrust on Tunis and moved major forces there-in the nick of time. The thrust

along the North African shore, then, was the main preoccupation in the weeks after the landings 

of 8 November 1942. Only after the coast had been blocked on the outskirts of Tunis did 

Eisenhower begin looking for alternatives. This occurred in December 1942, and the point is that 

neither the US II Corps nor the XII Air Support Command had been much involved in the 

fighting. 

By the 8th of December, things had calmed in Casablanca. The 33d Fighter Group had been 

removed from Port Lyautey and sent into Thelepte in central Tunisia. For a time, Eisenhower 

thought he might make a thrust from that area to the eastern coast of Tunisia well below Tunis

and so cut Rommel's retreat route before having to defeat Colonel- General Jüergen von Arnim's

force, which Hitler had quickly deployed to northern Tunisia to protect the ports. 7

 

One complicating factor may have been that the humiliation at Kasserine and the 

reorganization of the Allied air forces in Africa were so closely associated in time that an

unwarranted assumption of cause and effect was made by many. Through the last three weeks in 

32
December and in all of January in 1943, the 33d Fighter Group was suffering at Thelepte airfield,

heavily engaged both on the ground and in the air. No sooner had the unit been deployed to the

plain beneath the western dorsal range than the Luftwaffe began to contest the turf. But Rommel 

was still far to the south, and the II Corps was still gathering forces and not yet heavily engaged 

with Axis ground forces. 

The Casablanca Conference opened on 14 January 1943, and that is where the decision was 

made to reorganize the air forces into a more unified whole and to adapt the practices of the 

Western Desert Air Force to the air fighting in Tunisia. That is where the decision was made to 

centralize the control of tactical air forces under the command of an airman-an RAF airman, Sir

Arthur Coningham. 

Kasserine, then, cannot have been the cause of the- reorganization or the original stimulus

for a revision in doctrinal thinking. It is also questionable whether II Corps difficulties with air 

support can have been at the root of things, for it had not yet engaged in major offensive 

operations. If battlefield difficulties or the personalities of senior commanders were the stimuli of

the reorganization, it seems likely that RAF 242 Group's support for the First Army and the

problems between Air Marshal Welsh and his countryman General Anderson were more 

significant than the American difficulties. The RAF and the First Army had been most heavily 

engaged in unsuccessful air-ground operations before Casablanca, but the US II Corps had yet to 

engage in offensive operations that could have exposed much in the way of defects in air-ground 

doctrine. 

Ideas Extant in the USAAF 

Important to a judgment on the genesis of USAF doctrine on ground support is some

perception of the baseline, the starting point. What was the nature of Air Service and Air Corps 

thought on air-ground operations before Torch? How different was it from the concepts 

expounded in FM 100-20 of July 1943? 

I believe the seeds of the idea that the command of airpower should be centralized at the 

theater level and in the hands of an airman were present even in the Air Service of the American 

Expeditionary Forces in World War I. So, too, the notions that air superiority comes first and that 

airpower is inherently an offensive instrument were established before the Kaiser's war was over. 

Doubtless, much of the concept of airpower expounded by Billy Mitchell and William Sherman 

based on their wartime experiences had come to them from contact with foreign air forces,

especially the French (but also the British). The notions just expressed and even the idea that the 

moral effect of air attacks on troops would be a passing phenomenon are present in their 

writings. So too is the idea that those things plus the dispersion and field fortifications on the 

battlefield combined to make close air support less profitable than rear area attacks. 8

 

Thomas DeWitt Milling was in wartime Europe with Mitchell, Spaatz, and Mason Patrick. 

After returning to the United States, Milling became assistant commandant of the Air Service 

Field Officers School, the precursor of the famous Air Corps Tactical School. While he was at 

the school, he authored Training Regulation 440-15, Air Tactics. This 1922 treatise devoted a 

substantial portion to “attack” aviation. 9

 Since Spaatz was assigned to the school as a student not 

long afterward and since he much later cited Milling as the single most influential person on his

own career, it is no great inferential leap to suppose that Spaatz was fully conversant with 

Milling's concepts. 10 Furthermore, Spaatz was already a protégé of Billy Mitchell, who shared

33
most of Milling's ideas, and he was soon to become a member of Patrick's operations staff. 

(Patrick also adhered to many of the same notions.) 

Milling in 1922 was explicit in advising the centralized control of ground support aviation at 

the highest possible level-by an airman. He asserted also that the apparent moral effects of air 

attack on ground troops would probably wane rapidly to make low-altitude attack over the

battlefield an uneconomical proposition. The troopers would soon learn to stand up and fight, 

and their fire would be lethal to the aircraft. Further, target acquisition on the battlefield would 

be a tough problem since targets there would be dug in and dispersed. He also argued that targets 

in the enemy rear would be much more concentrated and relatively defenseless. Milling was 

strong too in his assertion that airpower is inherently offensive and flexible. That, along with the 

need to coordinate the operations of attack units with air superiority organizations, made

centralized control by an airman all the more imperative. In short, Milling's document would 

have served well as a catechism for air-ground training in preparation for the Battle of Kasserine 

Pass. We shall see all of his ideas again in Spaatz's preachments around Tunisia and in FM 100-

20 of July 1943-and in practically all of the USAF tactical doctrine manuals that followed. 11 

Doubtless it would be an inferential leap to identify those ideas with Milling alone. The Air 

Service had fewer than a thousand officers at the time, and practically all of them knew each 

other well-many had gone to West Point. More likely, the concepts were really corporate 

property, and Milling's function in 1922 and Kuter's in the writing of FM 100-20 twenty-one 

years later were to be articulators of the corporate knowledge and ideas. 

It is also worth noting at this point that the United States was the only nation in the world 

that maintained a dedicated ground support air organization during the entire decade of the 

1920s. It was not until the 1930s that Italy and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) 

developed such dedicated units, and the RAF did not have such an organization until many years 

after the 3d Attack Group had been established in the US Army Air Service (1921). 12 

Many have argued that the Air Corps became so obsessed with achieving a separate air force 

through strategic bombing doctrine that it ignored the tactical functions of airpower. 13 That 

attack aviation continued to have a low priority among airmen can hardly be doubted, but it was

not ignored. Firstly, the 1920s was as isolationist a period as the United States ever has had. The 

United States came away from World War I with the determination never again to become

involved in an overseas war. (The war debts issue only enhanced this determination.) In any 

case, the political climate dictated that the services plan only for defending the homeland, not for 

expeditionary action. The first requirement, then and until the late 1930s, was to prepare to meet 

an invasion from overseas; coastal defense operations, not air-ground tactics, were the essence of 

the airmen's work. In this, they were in perfect harmony with their political leaders. Airpower 

could meet invading fleets long before the ground forces engaged. The minuscule Army would 

require a long, long time to activate the industrial base and to mobilize significant surface forces.

Thus, it made sense to relegate ground support airpower to the Air Guard and Reserves to be 

mobilized while surface forces were being prepared. Coastal defense units would meanwhile

hold off enemy fleets until the armies and their air support units were ready. Many of the

maneuvers that were held as late as the mid-1930s employed a scenario of defending against an 

invading fleet aimed at Panama, Hawaii, or San Francisco. 14 

Even as the strategic bombing idea was maturing in the Air Corps, and especially in its 

Tactical School (now moved to Maxwell Field, Alabama), the 3d Attack Group continued its 

existence at Barksdale Field in Shreveport, Louisiana. The effort expended on the acquisition of 

air equipment dedicated to ground support was nothing like that committed to the pursuit and, 

34
especially, to the bomber programs, but the fact remains that a series of such aircraft were 

acquired. The Curtiss A-8, a dedicated ground support type, first flew in 1931. A ground support 

monoplane equipped with a water- cooled engine, the A-8 later became the A-12 when it was 

equipped with a Pratt & Whitney air-cooled radial engine. The first pursuit monoplane was the 

Boeing P-26, which first flew A year later. This does not necessarily indicate that pursuit 

thinking was less than current, for the wing stress requirements were doubtless greater. But 

neither is it an indicator that attack aviation was being ignored, unlikely in any event because of 

the necessity to keep the Army General Staff pacified. 15

Curtiss A-8 

Contrary to a common misconception, the Air Corps did not ignore 

tactical aviation between the wars. The liquid-cooled A-8, circa 1928, 

which was designed for the air-to- ground attack mission, was the first 

monoplane in regular line service in the United States. (Source: US Air 

Force) 

Curtiss A-12

Pictured here is the A-12, a derivative of the A-8. Powered by a Pratt 

and Whitney air-cooled engine, the A-12 came on line with the Air 

Corps in 1932, when all other air forces in the world were still in 

biplanes. (Source: US Air Force) 

The Flying Fortress flew first in 1935, but that did not shove the development of ground 

support aircraft off the agenda. 

The Northrop A-17 was a follow-on for the A-8/A-12. The Northrop airplane was acquired 

in respectable numbers (129) for that day, and the chief of the Air Corps himself, Oscar 

35
Westover, had one assigned as his personal plane. In fact, he killed himself in it in 1938 on the 

very day he had visited a bomber unit to present it with the Daedalian Flying Safety Trophy. 16

The final prewar sample in that line of development was the Douglas A-20 (the DB-7 in British 

service) which was produced in great numbers and remained a workhorse throughout the war. 17

Northrop A-17 

As early as 1935, the A-17 was flying with the Air Corps, first with 

fixed gear as shown here. The model issued to attack squadrons in 

1936 included retracting gear. The Luftwaffe’s Stuka flew on with 

fixed gear throughout World War Two. (Source: US Air Force) 

It is hardly to be denied that in the 1930s the strategic bombing idea came to dominate Air 

Corps thought; nevertheless, the Air Corps Tactical School curriculum continued to include 

instruction on ground support all through the period. The authority on the subject, Robert T. 

Finney, wrote in 1955: 

It is true that as concepts moved away from those derived from World War I experience toward

the idea of an independent air mission, less emphasis was placed on aviation in support of ground 

troops. Nevertheless, a subsection of the Air Force course was entitled Aviation in Support of 

Ground Forces in which by the mid-thirties, the concept was taught that gaining air superiority

was the most valuable contribution the air force could make to the ground campaign; next in

importance was attacking enemy lines of communications. Except in unusual situations, airpower 

was not to be employed against targets within range of friendly artillery; in an emergency, all or

part of the air force might be diverted to support of ground troops. A cardinal point in the air

philosophy expounded at the school was that airpower had to be centralized to be effective either 

in a close-support or strategic role. The school opposed, vigorously and vociferously, the 

assignment of combat elements of the air force to Army formations. 18 

36
Douglas A.20 

By 1938, the Air Corps had moved away from single-engine ground 

attack aircraft to a multiengine concept as shown here. The A-20, 

designated “Havoc” by the Americans and “Boston” by the British, 

contributed significantly to the downfall of Rommel in North Africa.

(Source: US Air Force) 

Nothing in that set of ideas would have made Arthur Coningham wince, and it was being 

taught to US Army Air Corps officers long before the Luftwaffe was to have its shot at them. It 

is to be noted that this was at the very time that the General Headquarters (GHQ) Air Force was 

being founded at Langley Field, and the concepts were not at all confined to fuzzy intellectuals 

of the school environment. General Headquarters contained all the combat aviation of the US 

Army except observation craft, and it was to report directly to the GHQ commander in time of 

war. Gen Henry H. Arnold, Carl Spaatz's closest friend, was the commander of the GHQ AF's

1st Wing on its founding, before he moved on to become assistant chief of the Air Corps under 

Oscar Westover (Spaatz had been Westover's assistant for operations during the airmail crisis

and, later, the executive officer for the GHQ AF's 2d Wing at Langley). On 8 October 1937

Arnold, much more the practical man of affairs than the academician, lectured at the US Army

War College. He pointed to the need for attack aviation to assault enemy airfields as a part of the 

air superiority campaign. He commended the Japanese for avoiding the wastage of airpower in 

small units against entrenched targets on the battlefield, and he condemned the air units in Spain 

that did not see the wisdom of it. Arnold thought one of the morals coming out of the Spanish 

story was this: 

[One should) not detach the air force to small commands where it will be frittered away in petty 

fighting. Hold it centrally and use it in its proper place, that is, where it can exert its power beyond

the influence of your other arms, to influence general action rather than the specific battle. 19 

The point is that notwithstanding what was stated in official Army doctrine, the main ideas

characteristic of what was to be the Western Desert Air Force were deeply imbedded in all parts 

of the US Army Air Corps all through the interwar period, though its officers had not made much 

headway among those of the other branches of the Army. 

37
The Stimulus for Air Reorganization in Africa 

If the principles of modern tactical air doctrine were already well understood among Air 

Corps officers long before the North African campaign, why did some say the official doctrine 

was so different from their concepts? Why did so many of the USAAF men welcome the aid of 

the RAF and Air Marshals Tedder and Coningham with such open arms? Why have the

American airmen been so ready to attribute so much of their own success to the mentorship of

the British? If the ideas were already so well understood among the American airmen, why were

the British so assertive about teaching them? If the understanding of the US Army airmen was so 

similar to that of the RAF members, why was a major reorganization of the air forces undertaken 

in the midst of the campaign? If Lt Gen Sir Bernard Montgomery's famous speech on command 

in war was really written by Air Marshal Coningham, why did Monty put his name to it? 

First, let it be noted there is no intent here to assert that the American airmen had nothing to 

learn and that they owed nothing to the leaders of the RAF for their instruction. 20 No one with 

even a rudimentary knowledge of the difference that combat experience makes on survival and 

on mission effectiveness would ever claim that one can learn all there is to be learned on the 

campus at Maxwell Field. Similarly, the impact of combat experience in the theater has been

proved so vital in all wars that the USAF is quite careful to make a substantial investment in 

theater indoctrination training. 21 What is being suggested is that most of the basic principles 

were already understood by the senior American airmen, and that what was to be learned were 

the many details arising from the peculiarities of the theater and from technical advances made 

since the previous war. Too, there was the problem of transferring the doctrinal insights held by 

RAF and USAAF senior leaders to operational personnel who would implement them on the 

battlefield. Perhaps it is not too much to suggest that the RAF mentorship phenomenon has been 

somewhat exaggerated because of a wide variety of factors in addition to those associated with

American disappointments on the battlefield. Among them might be sudden changes in strategy, 

the internal bureaucratic rivalry between the AAF and the rest of the Army, and some

nationalistic concerns arising from the fear that the British Empire was waning. 

We have seen that although the concentration of thought in the Air Corps of the thirties was 

clearly on strategic bombing, the concepts of tactical air doctrine were quite similar to those 

ultimately developed by the Western Desert Air Force. We have also noted that American 

soldiers and airmen had been marching according to a set of orders quite in harmony with the 

visions they had shared through the thirties-that it would take a substantial period of time to 

mobilize the industry and manpower for a multimillion-man army, and that, in the meantime, the 

air force would hold off the invaders for a time before the ground forces engaged. Therefore, the 

types of airplane needed for ground support could be safely put into the reserve forces and in the

mobilization plans. But those types needed for independent action against the enemy during the

mobilization period would have to be ready at the outset. 

The US armed forces started their regeneration just after the Munich Crisis in 1938, but even 

at the time of Pearl Harbor, the soldiers themselves thought it would be a long time past 1942 

before they could be ready to land on the hostile shores of France. It was (and is) an article of 

faith with them that an objective not only must be attainable, it also must be decisive. In their 

eyes, only the defeat of the Wehrmacht in northern Europe could be decisive. They were fully 

committed to the Germany First strategy and they supported the notion that an advance air force 

would be deployed to the United Kingdom to begin the weakening of the Germans. Eighth Air 

Force was constituted for that purpose, and its creation was quite in accord with the visions of

38
soldiers and airmen that it should be equipped largely with fighters and bombers and that the 

organizations to be used for ground support would come over later when the ground units were 

mobilized and deployed. 

All this was called to a sudden halt by a political decision that overrode the vision of the

airmen and the soldiers in the summer of 1942. In July the whole scheme was abruptly changed 

to involve major ground operations a whole year before anything beyond emergency landings in 

France had been contemplated. The sudden reversal required the constitution of Twelfth Air

Force for the African campaign largely out of the body of Eighth Air Force. Necessarily, then, 

the Eighth's aircraft had not been optimized for ground support, and few of its aircrews had had 

any training at all in air-ground operations. As great as the Spitfire was for air combat, it was

pretty poor for ground attack; those deployed with Twelfth Air Force did not even have bomb 

racks. The air forces cobbled together for Patton's deployment out of Norfolk came in large part 

from units that had trained for air defense, not for air-to-ground operations. The 33d Fighter 

Group, for example, which had been commanded by Brig Gen Elwood R Quesada (always 

known as Pete) for some months prior to the African campaign, was assigned to First Air Force, 

the organization dedicated to the air defense of the northeastern United States. It was everything

the groups could do to have the crews experience three launches from a simulated aircraft carrier 

catapult, much less to convert them from air defense to ground support missions. 22 The point is

that perhaps such inadequacy in air-ground work as existed may have arisen at least as much 

from the sudden change in strategy as from any doctrinal naiveté on the part of the USAAF 

leaders involved. 

Correlli Barnett has argued that Bernard Montgomery, who was accustomed to moving

forward only when he was fully prepared and certain that he had an overwhelming advantage, 

took on the Battle of El Alamein sooner than he had to. Barnett even suggests that Rommel

would have been required to retreat by the Torch landings in his rear even if Montgomery had 

never moved on El Alamein. He suggests that the British were corning out of a long string of 

defeats and, had Montgomery waited until after Torch, he and Britain would have had to share 

the glory with the Americans. It was allegedly the last chance the Empire had for an independent 

victory that would restore its prestige after the heavy blows suffered all the way from Norway to 

Singapore. 23 Whatever the merits of Barnett's argument, US soldiers came to Africa with the

notion that the United States would now be required to pull British chestnuts out of the fire, as in 

World War I. 

The isolationism mentioned above was too recent to be forgotten. Britain was among those 

nations which had not paid their First World War debts. The American soldiers and airmen had 

been dragged kicking and screaming into the African campaign in the first place. Also, while 

America's naval elite tended to come from urban areas in the coastal regions, the elite of her 

Army and its air forces still were disproportionately from the rural and interior regions, the very 

areas where isolationism had been the strongest and Germanic immigration the greatest. 24 The 

soldiers, especially, saw Torch as a peripheral action in the Gallipoli tradition which could not be 

decisive even if its objectives were attainable, and they suspected that the nefarious British 

schemes were to use Americans to sustain the Empire beyond its natural life span. Until this 

point, the United States, it is to be remembered, had long been first among the Third World 

powers-the leader of the anticolonial movement. That anti-imperial tradition, now largely 

forgotten, was still a part of the American mindset. 

Nor can it have been pleasant to have the British go over the heads of the Army and air force

leaders to the US president to have the services overruled. On top of that, American sailors

39
generally wanted dearly to go to the Pacific to avenge Pearl Harbor-and the British were 

obstructing their way. 25 Thus it can be seen that the British had motives in addition to the mere 

promotion of military efficiency in their desire to centralize air command. The Americans had

reasons other than the promotion of military effectiveness for suspecting their ally's motives. 

There were some good logical administrative motives for the reorganization and 

centralization of the air and ground forces operating in the Mediterranean. One was the 

convergence of the Torch forces from the west with those coming from the east in the wake of 

the victory at El Alamein. Whatever else was afoot, a victorious air force (the Western Desert 

Air Force) was with Montgomery only a hundred miles or so to the east of Tripoli when the 

Casablanca Conference opened. Soon it would be sharing the Tunisian airspace with Torch 

forces, and each would be commanded by headquarters many hundreds of miles apart. 

Gen Dwight D. Eisenhower deployed only token forces into southern and central Tunisia for 

a couple of months after the landings. Not until Christmas Eve, when he thought he might be 

able to deploy American forces down into the Tebessa area and then thrust to the coast near Sfax, 

separating Rommel and von Arnim for good, did he give up on the initial plan to capture Tunis 

with a thrust along the northern shore. At the time of the Casablanca Conference (14-24 January 

1943), he was setting up the US II Corps in the Tebessa region under the command of Maj Gen 

Lloyd Fredendall. However, when Eisenhower briefed the plan for the thrust to the coast, 

General Alexander suggested that it was rather risky to do it at an early time. Better to wait until 

Montgomery had arrived in Tripoli (which he did before the conference ended on 23 January 

1943) and restored the port facilities sufficiently to receive new fuel supplies by sea. That way, 

Montgomery could participate in operations that would put Rommel between two active forces 

and therefore improve his own prospects for success. 

Eisenhower took the advice and canceled the II Corps plan for an offensive toward Sfax and 

instructed it to remain on the defensive. 26 For us, the point is that the activities of II Corps and 

its XII Air Support Command had probably not yet developed sufficiently to be a major cause of

the reorganization and centralization decisions made at Casablanca. 

Just What Was Learned from the RAF? 

I have already argued on what was not learned from the RAF by the American airmen. 

Exactly what were some of the things they did learn? The American airmen were not as reticent 

as might be expected in admitting that they learned a great deal from their Allies. 27 Most of the 

doctrinal things were already known to the higher USAAF officers, though the wartime 

temporary officers were certainly not well schooled in those areas when they arrived in Africa. 

Some details, often peculiar to the theater, were important and shared by the British. In the area

of staff work, the RAF had the USAAF outclassed by a rather wide margin. That had been a 

factor in the 1942 debate over the wisdom of Torch, and the issue arose again during the 

Casablanca Conference. 28 

Another area in which the American airmen had already learned a great deal was in the 

systems approach to air research and development. It could hardly have been otherwise, given 

the great advantage the British had achieved over the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain. Carl 

Spaatz and several other USAAF leaders who had deployed to Great Britain as observers became

acquainted with some of the less visible parts of the British air defense system: for example, the

radar reporting network and the command and control structure. 29 

40
Another notable learning experience during the African campaign was that the British

airmen enjoyed superior intelligence work compared to that received by the USAAF. Previously 

(and for a long time afterward) the elite of the air forces had disdained intelligence as a career 

field. Spaatz recognized this and moved to have Arnold identify some regular officers for 

deployment to his theater to learn intelligence with the intent to make it their career. 30 Similarly,

in the Air Corps days, no right-thinking he-man aviator would willingly get into the planning 

field as a career move, and Spaatz recognized that the RAF had a large lead in that area. 

Therefore, in the same request, he also sought a group of regulars to train in-theater for a postwar 

career in planning. 31 

The RAF led the world into the radar age. It did so in air defense, in strategic bombing, and 

in tactical operations. In the early days of its operations at Thelepte (December 1942- February 

1943), the 33d Fighter Group suffered casualties by the want of radar and suitable sites for its 

antennas. It also suffered from the want of an efficient reporting network. Here was another

dimension of learning for Spaatz and the other American airmen. The American soldiers already 

understood the importance of grasping good landing grounds for the sake of air superiority. But 

the airmen and soldiers had to learn from the RAF that the high ground for radars had to be 

conquered along with the airfields if the Luftwaffe was to be defeated. 32 

In all the interwar years before 1935, the Air Service and Air Corps had been organized 

geographically, which airmen found obnoxious. In 1935 the GHQ AF, as we have noted, was 

founded to centralize almost all air combat power of the Army under a single air commander. 

That was the ideal envisioned by most in the Air Corps. In Great Britain in 1940, and then again 

in Africa in 1942 and 1943, Spaatz was exposed to the British system of dividing its airpower 

according to function: Bomber Command, Fighter Command, Coastal Command, and so forth. 

After the war (and much to the horror of some on his staff), Spaatz, the commanding general, 

USAF, agreed with Eisenhower to split airpower into functional organizations: Air Defense 

Command, Strategic Air Command, and Tactical Air Command. That was very much against the

GHQ AF ideal and in line with the British practice. Spaatz afterward claimed that he and 

Eisenhower based this decision on their wartime experience. 33 

A certain internationalism among airmen resembles that formerly found among ordnance 

officers, making it difficult to identify the original source of ideas. It cannot be denied that the 

Americans learned a great deal from the RAF, and perhaps the main pillars of the tactical air

doctrine that they carried into Torch had some of their origins in the RAF at some earlier time. 

Spaatz was most influenced by the French in World War I, for he had been the Air Service 

commander at 3d Instructional Center, Issoudon, where at the outset most of his instructors were 

French. Less well known is the fact that he spent a short period of temporary duty flying with the 

British in that war. 34 Gen Billy Mitchell had personal contact with Hugh Trenchard during

World War I and, somewhere along the line, Spaatz also became acquainted with the father of 

the RAF. Even then, Spaatz was a protégé of Mitchell, and from 1922 to 1924 Spaatz was 

commander at Selfridge Field, Michigan, where Mitchell was a frequent visitor and even a house 

guest, the very period when Mitchell was highest on tactical airpower. 35 It seems likely,

therefore, that Spaatz and the other erudite Americans began learning from the RAF many years 

before Torch and, from whatever source, they had already gained a pretty firm grasp of the major

tenets of tactical air doctrine long before they encountered either Bernard Montgomery or Arthur 

Coningham. What remained to be learned by the American airmen, it seems to me, were the

details of application in that environment. For the American soldiers, most remained 

unconvinced of the validity of the main doctrinal ideas of either British or American airmen. 

41
Gen Carl A. “Tooey” Spaatz 

Here pictured pinning a Legion of Merit on his executive officer, Capt 

Sally Bagby, General Spaatz headed the air units in the North African 

Campaign. Long pictured as a patron saint of the “Bomber Barons,” 

Spaatz had actually been a fighter pilot and was a main developer of 

tactical air doctrine. (Source: US Air Force) 

On Cause and Effect 

The winter of 1942-43 was one of those traumatic times when world-shaking events seem to 

tumble upon us in rapid succession. It was the time of Guadalcanal and Stalingrad. Midway was

only a short time in the past. El Alamein was still closer. Pearl Harbor, the Bataan Death March, 

and the Doolittle Raid were all fresh in our memories. There was a great convergence of both

national and institutional interests in the Mediterranean Basin. In those helter-skelter times, it 

was all too easy for some with no time for thought and analysis to lose the trail of cause-andeffect and make inferential leaps. The sequence of events sometimes gets muddled, and 

sometimes personal or institutional interests prevent individuals who could unmuddle it from 

doing so. Posterity, gazing back on that hectic winter, saw the shock of Kasserine immediately; 

only more slowly did it recognize that the arrival of the RAF air leaders in Northwest Africa,

preaching the Western Desert Air Force doctrine, substantially improved the ground and air 

situations. Is it arguable that many observers made an inferential leap on cause-and-effect based 

on an apparent sequence of events, and that neither American nor British airmen had the time or 

motivation to question the validity of the inference? 

42
What Were the Causes of the Turnabout in the Air? 

It will not do to denigrate the importance of Arthur Coningham's significant role in the 

turnabout. The combination of his prestige, his optimism and self-confidence, his determination, 

his preference for offensive tactics, and his operational strategies all had their effect. But he did 

not arrive until the Battle of Kasserine Pass was well under way. The decision to put him in 

command of the tactical air war had been made at Casablanca well before II Corps was 

established in central Tunisia, so it is perhaps arguable that the turning of the tide in Tunisia 

involved much more than merely reorganizing the air command structure and importing a new 

doctrine. 

As we have noted, to some extent Kasserine emitted a false signal. The airmen, at least in

Rommel's view, got somewhat of a bad rap-airpower did not playas much of a role as Rommel

feared because poor weather grounded both XII Air Support Command and the Luftwaffe. But 

Rommel's forces took a considerable beating on the way back through the pass, just as German 

forces did during the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944 when the weather cleared. 36

Kasserine Pass 

Site of defeat for US forces, Kasserine Pass is the most famous 

landmark associated with US air doctrine. (Source: National Archives) 

Another factor that is usually left out of the discussion about close air support in the period 

between the invasion and Kasserine is the artillery situation. American artillery forces have 

enjoyed a great reputation ever since Robert E. Lee felt their sting. One of the principal 

differences between the US Marine Corps and US Army's approaches to close air support 

revolves around the artillery. The Army is designed to fight sustained and large campaigns, 

which calls for ample artillery support. Guns and their ammunition are weighty and 

cumbersome, however-too cumbersome to be easily brought ashore in landing craft. The Marine 

Corps on the other hand, is designed for forcible entry, over the beach, but its operations are

envisioned as much smaller and of short duration. Once the lodgment is secure, the Army is 

brought in and the Marine Corps units are withdrawn for other missions. Therefore, the Marines 

43
are much more lightly equipped with artillery, and their reliance on close air support is absolute. 

This is feasible because the Marine battleground is smaller and the duration of fight is shorter as 

compared with the Army situation. It is therefore possible to provide much denser close air 

support for the marine than it is for the soldier. What is often lost in Torch discussions is that 

while the II Corps in central Tunisia was established in place, the artillery allotted above the 

division level was not. Insofar as the want of heavy fire support was a factor in the difficulties, it 

arose in part from the absence of heavy artillery. Some guns did arrive at the very last minute, 

which allowed for a measure of mayhem to be inflicted on the Germans as they passed back 

through the pass. But for us, the meaning is that not all of the weakness in fire support was due to 

the distance from usable airfields and the bad weather. Some of it arose from the bulkiness of the 

standard artillery and ammunition combined with the thinness of the transportation net leading

from Morocco and Algeria to the battleground. 37 

As bad as Kasserine was, it is also true that it was practically Rommel's last, best shot, and it 

did not work. Tactically, it was an embarrassment. Strategically, the German objectives were not 

achieved; there was no chance thereafter that the Allies would fail in Tunisia. 38 That became an

established fact on 22 February, the day Rommel turned around, only four days after Coningham

had arrived. 

Another among the reasons the Allies would not again be defeated was that the tide of 

numbers was going strongly against the Axis. Tripoli was restored and, with the arrival of every 

convoy there from the east and with every one from the west, the weight of numbers improved 

for the Allies. 

Whatever the impact of improved doctrine, leadership, and numbers, it is also true that the 

AAF gradually was able to improve its tactical radar system. This had been a serious difficulty at 

Thelepte in the early days when the absence of radar permitted Ju-88s to arrive over the field, do 

their damage, and scoot back in the direction of their bases before P-40s could launch and climb 

to altitude, or else the alternative, standing patrols over the base, would wear down our forces 

and guarantee that they would be outnumbered when the attack came. 39 However, as the 

campaign progressed, airfields became better developed, ground transportation for crews arrived,

and most importantly, gaps in the radar screens were filled. 40 

The primitive conditions at Thelepte and the oilier fields, along with the absence of radar, 

wore down units and crew members so rapidly that it was hard to maintain experience levels. 

The 33d Fighter Group, for example, was withdrawn from Thelepte after a two-month stay 

because it was impossible to replace its losses as they occurred. 41 Fortunately, after Kasserine, 

the flow of replacements improved and the achievement of air superiority, among other things, 

reduced the losses. This had the effect of increasing the experience level among crews, which 

also improved all aspects of air operations. 

The opposite trend was occurring with the Luftwaffe. Its losses could not be replaced as 

easily, not only because of the interdiction of the line of communications but also because 

demands made on the Luftwaffe in other theaters, especially those at Stalingrad, made it 

impossible to satisfy the need for an adequate force in North Africa. Worse still, the Axis flyers' 

experience level was in decline just as the experience level of their Allied counterparts was 

rising. 42

44
33d Fighter Group P-40s aboard the USS Chenango 

The 33d deployed to North Africa with its P-40s under the command 

of Lt Cot William W. Momyer, who later served on the Air War

College faculty, the Tactical Air Command staff, and as commander, 

Seventh Air Force, in Vietnam. Momyer was a moving force in 

doctrinal matters. (Source: US Air Force) 

45
Col William W. Momyer 

Colonel Momyer actually had had some experience with the Western

Desert Air Forces before he took command of the 33d in Southern 

Tunisia. His men faced rough conditions until US forces were built up

after Kasserine. (Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

33d Fighter Group aboard the USS Chenango 

46
The 33d fighters launched from the carrier directly onto the field at 

Port Lyautey. Only two planes were lost at sea, but the bombardment

of the field by the Navy had so damaged it, that many planes crashed 

on landing. (Source: US Air Force) 

Though the Luftwaffe was losing ground in terms of experience level in the wake of 

Kasserine, compression of the Axis forces into a smaller region tended to increase the density of

available antiaircraft and Luftwaffe units. At the time of Kasserine, the Luftwaffe had enjoyed an 

enormous advantage in terms of being able to operate from developed, all-weather airfields close

to the battleground, while the Allied forces were on bases undeveloped and muddy and far from 

the action. However, after Kasserine, the Allied forces gave the Axis bases an increased 

pounding that first drove the bomber and transport units back to Sicily and beyond, and finally, 

the fighter units too. Gradually the ground forces captured those developed bases, and Allied air 

forces were able to move their operations into them, multiplying their effectiveness. 43 

The improvement of airfields and increased air supplies in the weeks after Kasserine had a

decided effect. At first C-47 units were pressed into inefficient service to haul such bulk items as 

bombs and gasoline to the forward areas, but gradually the air units were able to get somewhat 

better priorities on the sparse railroads of North Africa, and emergency measures to employ a 

whole sea convoy full of trucks bore fruit. 44 

Bell P-39 

The P-39, shown here with a 33d Fighter Group pilot In North Africa, 

had been designated as an Interceptor, but proved useless In that role 

because its lack of a supercharger so limited Its high-altitude

performance that It could not compete with German and Japanese 

fighters. Its propeller-hub-mounted 37-mm cannon did prove useful in 

47
ground attack, provided it had escort above from the Group's P-40s. 

(Source: US Air Force) 

The first waves of airmen in Torch could not have had any theater indoctrination at all. In 

the years since, it has been repeatedly established that the first 10 combat missions are far more 

dangerous than all that follow. General experience is a major factor in achieving effectiveness,

but theater experience is also vital. After the Twelfth Air Force was established ashore, a training 

command was set up, in part as a holding operation for the temporary assignment of incoming 

personnel en route to their units at the front and in part for theater acclimation. Later, instructor

slots were manned with airmen who had finished their combat tours and who were held in theater 

for a time afterward so they could share their combat-wise knowledge with the new arrivals. This 

could not have had much effect before Kasserine, but the results were cumulative, and it helped

turn the tide in the air. 45 

Another item that had an enormous effect on the defeat of the Luftwaffe was Ultra

intelligence. Increasingly after the Battle of Kasserine, the combination of superior intelligence

and the appropriate use of airpower against the Axis supply line allowed for interdiction both at 

sea and in the air. Not only were some famous massacres on Luftwaffe formations achieved but 

also supplies to the survivors in Tunisia dwindled, either putting them out of the fight or forcing 

them to move north. 46 All this had little to do with any changes in either the organization of air

forces or changes in tactical air doctrine. 

A casualty of war 

A part of the reason that the US Army Air Forces were not enamored 

with the dive bombing practiced by the Luftwaffe and the US Navy 

was that It was seen as flying right down the barrel of an antiaircraft 

gun. The Army preferred low-level, high-speed bombers and fighterbombers, thought to be less vulnerable. But the A-20 was not

invulnerable, as shown by this casualty of the war against Hitler.

(Source: US Air Force) 

48
North American B-25 

Here seen over Tunisia, the B-25 medium bomber was employed 

against enemy airfields in North Africa. (Source: US Air Force) 

Doctrine and leadership also got some of the credit that might have belonged to climate. 

With time, the rainy season ended. Air forces that were mired in mud due to rain and the absence 

of paved runways and hardstands were suddenly freed. The Luftwaffe's advantage in operating 

from developed fields was thus diminished by the return of good weather. 47 

In Vietnam it could be argued that Linebacker II often gets the credit for a “victory” that 

should be credited to the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT I), the rapprochement with 

Peking, and the election of 1972. Similarly, between the end of the race for Turns and the 

coming of the spring, remote political factors helped turn the tide against the Axis in Tunisia.

The Fifth Army and substantial air forces were retained in Algeria and Morocco against the 

possibility that 

the Spanish would thrust southward across the Allied line of communications through the 

Straits of Gibraltar. With time, it became increasingly clear that Francisco Franco had realized

the wisdom in remaining neutral, and it became possible to redeploy those forces against 

Rommel and von Arnim, further increasing the Allied numerical advantage. 48

Lockheed P-38 

The P-38 Lightning was a mainstay of US air forces in North Africa. 

This one is taking off from La Senia Airfield in Algeria. (Source: 

National Air and Space Museum) 

49
Douglas A-20 

A rare sight since Allied bombers could not normally bomb at low

altitudes without devastating losses, these Havocs are unloading over a 

Nazi airfield in eastern Tunisia. (Source: National Archives) 

P-40 bomb load 

Armorers “bomb up” a P-40 for a ground attack mission. (Source: 

National Air and Space Museum) 

Thus, it is hardly to be questioned that the contribution of the officers of the RAF and the 

application of the doctrine they had employed in the Western Desert Air Force were substantial 

to the victory in Tunis. It is also to be noted that many other factors influenced the outcome and 

quite possibly were operating to force the Axis out of Africa, even had the organizational and 

doctrinal changes not occurred. 

50
The Role of the RAF? 

What, then, might be tentatively identified as the real role of the RAF in the Tunisian

campaign? Clearly, it did teach much to the American airmen. Yet, that part of the work might 

not have been as revolutionary as some have thought. I propose the possibility that the American 

airmen already had a conceptual framework for the application of tactical airpower that was very 

similar to Tedder's and Coningham's. What was taught to the US airmen might well have been 

primarily how to apply these concepts to the problem at hand. It also seems clear to me that the

American soldiers did not hold a vision of air war that resembled the one held by British air

leaders. 

Perhaps it would be accurate to modify the conventional historical view of the RAF's role to

say that the prestige it enjoyed from support of a victorious ground officer (Montgomery), 

combined with the frustrations of the US Army's first campaign, enabled British and American 

airmen to sell some American ground officers on the main ideas of the vision common to airmen

of both countries. It also seems fair to say, with the passage of time, that even this achievement 

was strictly limited. The Marshalls and Eisenhowers of the ground forces certainly gave at least 

lip service to the idea and the support of a separate air force in the postwar years. But it is 

questionable whether many of the middling and junior officers of the Army were ever sold on the 

priority of interdiction over close air support. As recently as the spring of 1993, a faculty 

member of the National Defense University, Dr. Alan Gropman, was pessimistic on the subject. 

He asserted that the current joint force air component commander system used in Desert Storm 

still has only papered over the problem of a lack of centralized control of airpower at the theater

level. 49

Gen Dwight D. Eisenhower and Mal Gen James H. Doolittle 

51
General Doolittle, commander of the Northwest African Strategic Air 

Force-as well as the Twelfth Air Force-after the Casablanca 

reorganization, receives the Distinguished Service Medal from General 

Eisenhower, Allied commander in chief. General Spaatz looks on.

(Source National Air and Space Museum) 

The Role of Carl Spaatz? 

How did Gen Carl A. Spaatz fit into all this? I for one do not believe he needed much 

persuading of the wisdom of the notions that controlled the organization and employment of the

Western Desert Air Force. Rather, as a key member of the interwar Air Service and Air Corps, 

he shared the corporate attitudes that arose during the First World War and which persisted in the

American air arm in all the years between the wars. This set of ideas, or at least the main 

framework, I would argue, was very similar to the one that the British had evolved between 

Dunkirk and El Alamein. But many of the notions were indeed alien to most soldiers in the

American Army, and perhaps remain so today, to a certain extent. 

Mal Gen Carl Spaatz and Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder 

General Spaatz confers with Air Chief Marshal Tedder shortly after

the Casablanca Conference (January 1943). (Source: National Air and 

Space Museum) 

52
Allied medium antiaircraft gun 

One of the reasons for the demand that Allied planes provide 

continuous air cover-disapproved by doctrine-was a lack of antiaircraft 

guns. This one protected a desert air base. (Source: National Archives) 

Remains of German tank 

US Army Infantrymen inspect a German tank destroyed by air in the 

successful Allied counterattack at Kasserine. (Source: National 

Archives) 

53
French P-40s 

French air forces helped make up the Allied air team in North Africa.

Here, the French accept US P-40s in an official ceremony. (Source: 

National Air and Space Museum) 

German General Jüergen von Arnim 

Commander of German forces In North Africa after Rommel departed,

General von Arnim surrendered to Allied forces on 13 May 1943.

(Source: US Air Force) 

Insofar as Eisenhower was the main driver of the decision to bring Spaatz to Africa, perhaps 

his most compelling reason for doing so was the difficulty he was experiencing regarding the 

rivalry between American airmen and their British counterparts. Eisenhower himself is often 

painted as the great facilitator, the great integrator of the efforts of temperamental nationalists 

from various countries. Spaatz may also have made his main contribution in the same arena. He 

54
provided an important service in causing the airmen and the soldiers of the US Army to move in

the same direction. His previous service with the British in 1940 and earlier had promoted many 

friendships that helped smooth the troubled waters around proud RAF men and confident 

USAAF flyers. As we have shown, he did not always please his British allies, but his low-profile 

method of leadership was certainly less aggravating to the RAF men than those of some of his 

more abrasive countrymen-George S. Patton, for example. 50 

Conclusion 

I believe that the new studies on tactical airpower in the African campaign cited here and a 

revisit to some of the primary sources associated with the role of Carl Spaatz justify at least a 

slight readjustment of some of the conventional views of the experience. Most of the ideas 

sometimes said to have originated in the Western Desert Air Force and then taught to the 

American airmen were already common among the latter. Vietnam, among many other wars, 

showed that airmen benefit greatly from a theater indoctrination, no matter how experienced they 

are when they arrive. Perhaps this is what the RAF leaders did for the USAAF senior leaders in 

Tunisia. Perhaps a more important role for the RAF was to help the American airmen sell their

common ideas to the US soldiers. In this, I would argue, the airmen were none too successful. 

The US Army has rebuilt its own combat air arm with rotary wings. The main thrust of Gen 

William W. Momyer's Airpower in Three Wars is that, notwithstanding the enthusiasm of 

Laurence S. Kuter for the achievements of FM 100-20, the centralized control of airpower was 

never truly achieved in that or any of the subsequent American wars. 51 

The recent writings of some official USAF historians, it seems to me, are significant in their

readjustment of some of the older views. Richard Davis certainly seems correct in his remarks 

that Spaatz was less the neophyte student than a fully matured airman-one who greatly facilitated 

cooperation between soldier and airman (though that task was somewhat distasteful to him) and 

between American and Briton. 52 Davis also rings true when he points out that, notwithstanding 

George Marshall's approval of FM 100-20 in July 1943, many in the Army Ground Forces, 

including the commanding general, were unpersuaded. He is equally correct in pointing out that 

Spaatz remained skeptical that the problem had been solved and that Spaatz was an undoctrinaire 

leader prepared to ignore the party line when it got in the way of effectiveness. Daniel Mortensen

also contributes toward an adjustment in the conventional interpretations in his Pattern for Joint 

Operations. He shares some of the ideas attributed to Davis and makes the point that the notions 

associated with the Western Desert Air Force were not at all unique to the RAF. 53 He also points 

out that American airmen shared some of the ideas but many of the soldiers did not, even to the

point of ignoring compromise ideas already in FM 31-35. Aviation in Support of Ground Forces, 

or in directives from Eisenhower. Yet, the interpretations of Davis and Mortensen and a few

other authorities have received little notice outside official history circles of the USAF. Perhaps 

it is now time for the larger community of military historians to consider some of their writings

and to circulate them to a wider audience. 

Some questions for consideration might include these: Is coequality to some degree 

synonymous with the more modern term “jointness”? Is it in the order of things for the

organization in the driver's seat to reject notions of equality and jointness? Is it natural for 

services seeing themselves as number two to press hard for coequality and jointness? Everybody 

in sight now protests the uniqueness of the Desert Storm experience, but the protests from folks 

with an Army or Navy background come with more conviction than the protests coming from 

55
56

Notes 

airmen. Is the plea that Desert Storm was a wonderful application of the AirLand Doctrine an 

assertion (similar to the old USAAF cries for coequality) really only a belated, tacit recognition 

on the parts of infantrymen that the tide has turned, that they are no longer the lords of battle? 

Does such a plea for jointness and coequality tend to mask a message of Desert Storm; that is, 

sometimes lives can be saved if surface forces move from being the supported force beyond 

mere coequality into a position where they are indeed supporting forces? Is the new affinity 

among the sailors and many of the soldiers for jointness and coequality a tacit admission of a 

fear that this might be the wave of the future? Is it possible that this affinity for jointness can 

sometimes itself be an expression of parochialism? Would it be possible for jointness to become 

as obsessive as strategic bombing is said to have been in the old Air Corps? If indeed these 

things tend to mask real options for some future conflicts, are we in danger of permitting greater 

human losses than necessary for the sake of interservice harmony? 

For the sake of both history and the future, then, would it be both kinder and more accurate 

to reject the image of a USAAF glider in the propwash of the RAF? Instead, might a truer view 

be the RAF and the USAAF as both members of a flight, with the USAAF often on the wing but 

sometimes in the lead? Is it time to recognize in doctrine that sometime, somewhere, it may be 

appropriate that these air forces be the supported flight leaders, with their respective surface 

forces traveling as the supporting wingmen? 

1

 Quoted in Thomas A. Bailey, A Diplomatic History of the American People, 7th ed. (New 

York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1964), 182. 

2

 I do not mean to assert here that this is a universally held picture. Insofar as it has been the 

conventional wisdom, several modem authors have moved to correct it, including Richard Davis, 

Richard Hallion, Vincent Orange, and Daniel Mortensen. Their version, however, is largely 

embedded in official histories that have not yet received as wide a circulation as they have 

deserved. Mortensen's work is A Pattern for Joint Operations: World War II Close Air Support. 

North Africa (Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History and US Army Center of Military 

History, 1987), Hallion's is Strike from the Sky: The History of Battlefield Air Attack, 1911-

1945 (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989), and Davis's is Carl A. Spaatz and 

the Air War in Europe (Washington. D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 1993). (Davis told the 

African part of the story with great effect in an internal USAF publication titled “Tempering the 

Blade,” an Air Staff Historical Study dated 1989.) Vincent Orange's Coningham: A Biography of 

Air Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham, KCB, KBE, OSO, MC, DFC, FC (London: Metheun, 1990) 

was not produced in the United States until the Center for Air Force History republished it with a 

date of 1992. Some samples of what I think has been the conventional attitude include “Air 

Support in Tunisia?” News Week, 1 March 1943, as reprinted in Cavalry Journal, March-April 

1943, 34, asserting that the RAF and the USAAF were too preoccupied with strategic operations 

to provide proper close air support; Gen Omar N. Bradley and Clay Blair, A General's life: An 

Autobiography (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1983), arguing, (125), that among the British 

goals at Casablanca was one “to kick Ike upstairs and insert experienced British air and ground 

generals under him to run the war in Tunisia,” (129), “Not only that, Ike's land, sea and air 

commanders were now all British and they were calling the military shots,” and (151), “The 

British had fought a long, hard, costly battle across North Africa, and I admired their courage 

and battlefield expertise. But I was not convinced that they were infallible or as good as their 
57

Notes 

press notices”; Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Cate, eds. The Army Air Forces in World 

War II, vol. 2, Europe: Torch to Pointblank, August 1942 to December 1943 (1949; new imprint, 

Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 1983) (the official US Air Force history), 

remarking that after North Africa, whole air forces, the Ninth and Twelfth, became specialized in 

tactical airpower and that “What was at least as important, the NAAF incorporated the principles 

of air warfare which had been learned in the Middle East and demonstrated more recently by 

hard experience in Tunisia”; Joe C. Dixon, ed, History of U.S. Air Power, vol. 5, Project Warrior 

Study Guide (Gunter Air Force Station, Ala.: Air University Extension Course Institute, 1984) (a 

basic text still used in official USAF correspondence courses), 32, arguing that the AAF entered 

the war without an articulated air concept of employment and a lack of interest in ground support 

operations (it had to develop a doctrine under the stress of combat in North Africa, and the 

British came along to straighten it out); Hallion, (172-74), showing that the American airmen on 

the scene were greatly influenced by Air Marshal Arthur Coningham and were influential in the 

genesis of FM 100-20, which came to be seen as a disastrous AAF “Declaration of 

Independence” by many in the Army Ground Forces, and (149), explicitly saying that the US 

system owed its origins to the RAF desert experience; and George F. Howe, United States Army 

in World War II: The Mediterranean Theater of Operations: Northwest Africa: Seizing the 

Initiative in the West (Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, Office of the Chief of 

Military History, 1957), (400), arguing that notwithstanding the wide opinion in AAF circles that 

the air support problems had been solved in Tunisia, disagreement was still wide on the issue of 

control among ground officers, and (674), citing German reports to show that the Germans 

shared the view that the AAF was the junior partner: “Benefiting from British experience and 

applying British principles, the Americans had achieved more effective air-ground cooperation”; 

James A. Huston, “Tactical Use of Air Power in World War II: The Army Experience,” Military 

Affairs 14, no. 4 (Winter 1950): 166-200. 

3

 Robert H. Scales Jr., Firepower in Limited War (Washington, D.C.: National Defense 

University Press, 1990), 11-12. Erwin Rommel was on the other side of the hill and clearly 

would not have agreed with Colonel Scales: “The bad weather, despite the difficulties it gave us 

(the Germans at Kasserine) was actually very much to our advantage, as it prevented the enemy 

from bringing the full weight of his air force to bear, the effect of which, in the deep, ravine-like 

valleys, would have been very severe.” B. H. Liddell Hart, ed; The Rommel Papers (New York: 

Harcourt, Brace, 1953), 403. 

4

 In his command diary for 3 January 1943, General Spaatz recorded a conversation that he 

had that day with General Eisenhower in which it was stated that it should become a matter of 

doctrine for ground and naval commanders to protect themselves from dive bombers and lowlevel bombers through antiaircraft artillery (AAA), especially light-caliber fire-and this, well 

before Kasserine. In the diary entry for 17 January, Spaatz reported visiting the II Corps 

commander, Maj Gen Lloyd Fredendall, and asserting to him that the only reasonable place for 

his air commander was right at his own headquarters. In a conference the next day with 

Eisenhower and other senior commanders, Spaatz discussed the use of “strategic” airpower 

during the anticipated retreat of Rommel from the Mareth Line. The question was whether to use 

it against Rommel in the south or to continue the emphasis on interdicting his line of 

communications across the Mediterranean through Bizerte and Tunis. The decision was in favor 

of interdiction, which is much more in accord with the ideas that Coningham would bring the 
58

Notes 

following month, than it is with those of the ground commanders (of course, Spaatz had been in 

close contact with RAF men since 1940 and had flown with them in World War I, so attempting 

to pinpoint the origin of ideas is inexact at best). Diary of Gen Carl A. Spaatz, Carl A Spaatz 

Papers, Manuscripts Division (MD) , Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (hereafter cited as 

Spaatz Papers), box 10. Gen Bernard Montgomery early in 1943 issued a famous pamphlet on 

the command of air-ground forces in war. It had been set in type and printed, and although the 

cover contained the caution, “Not to be Published,” it was spread far and wide. One copy found 

its way into the Spaatz Papers and can be found in box 10. Bernard Montgomery, “Some Notes 

on High Command in War” (Maxwell AFB, Ala.: Air Force Historical Research Agency 

[AFHRA], January 1943). Most of the same ideas wound up in FM 100-20 published in 

Washington the following July. Although the pamphlet is dated January 1943, a conference on 

doctrine among high-level officers was organized and held in Tripoli on 16 February while the 

Battle at Kasserine Pass was in its early phases (the airfield occupied by the 33d Fighter Group at 

Thelepte received orders to evacuate the next evening). Though the document carried 

Montgomery's name, Arthur Tedder later remarked that it had been written by Coningham some 

weeks earlier. Orange, 132-34. 

5

 Montgomery, “Notes,” Spaatz Papers, box 10; Orange, 130-32. 

6

 Howe, 147-70; Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 116-26; History, 33d Fighter Group, 

US AAFs, January 1941-5 April 1943. 

7

 Craven and Cate, 124-40; Thomas J. Maycock, “Notes on the Development of AAF 

Tactical Air Doctrine,” Military Affairs 14 (1950): 186-89. 

8

 Lee B. Kennett, “Developments to 1939,” in Case Studies b1 the Development of Close 

Air Support, ed. Benjamin Franklin Cooling (Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 

1990), 16-26,43; William C. Sherman, “Tentative Manual for the Employment of Air Service. 

1919” in The U.S. Air Service in World War I, vol. 2, Early Concepts of Military Aviation, ed. 

Maurer Maurer (Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 1978). Sherman is quite clear on 

some of the very points that had to be made by Gen Carl Spaatz as he traveled about talking to 

both airmen and soldiers-and by my instructor pilot on my early training missions in Vietnam. 

One of Sherman's axioms was, “If the target is surprised, fire from the ground will not be severe, 

but if time is given for the preparation, the chance of loss of machines will be greater.” Sherman, 

373. My instructor's advice in 1968 was the same, “Never make a second pass at a drop zone.” 

Sherman is especially clear on the reasons why rear area attacks are likely to be more productive 

than close air support. Writing in December 1924, the commander of the American 

Expeditionary Force’s Air Service and chief of Air Service, Maj Gen Mason M. Patrick, 

explicitly advocated the centralized control of airpower, at least in the early phases of a war, by a 

coequal airman. Maj Gen Mason Patrick, chief of the Air Service, “Reorganization of Air Forces 

for National Defense,” report to the adjutant general of the Army, 19 December 1924, Spaatz 

Papers, box 3. 

9

 Maj Thomas D. Milling, “Air Tactics,” draft Training Regulation 440-15 (Langley Field, 

Va.: Air Service Field Officers School, 1922), copy in US Army Military History Institute, 

Carlisle Barracks, Pa., C. H. M. Roberts Papers; see also William Mitchell, “Tactical Application 

of Military Aeronautics,” lecture, US Army General Staff College, 1921, copy at Military 

History Institute, Carlisle Barracks, Pa., file number 97-10, in which Mitchell articulates many of 

the same ideas given in more elaborate form by Milling. 
59

Notes 

10 Milling was the assistant commandant while Spaatz was a student, and when he wrote his 

efficiency report at the end of the course he remarked that he would rather have Spaatz than 

anyone else in the world as a pursuit commander. Robert T. Finney, History of the Air Corps 

Tactical School, 1920-1940, USAF Historical Study No. 100 (Maxwell AFB, Ala.: USAF 

Historical Division, Air University, 1955), 54; Carl A. Spaatz 201 File, War Department, 

Adjutant General Form No. 67 (efficiency report), 18 June 1925, National Records Center, St. 

Louis, Mo. 

11 Thomas D. Milling, “Air Tactics,” draft regulation. 

12 Lee B. Kennett, The First Air War, 1914-1918 (New York: Free Press, 1991), 30. 

13 Scales, II, is one modern example. 

14 Many of the exercises featured coastal defense, and those that envisioned cooperation 

with ground units were far more frequent than anything resembling attacks on cities or industrial 

targets. Maurer Maurer, Aviation in the U.S. Army. 1919-1939 (Washington, D.C.: Office of Air 

Force History, 1987), 76-80, 108-11, 239-53. One example is expressed by Spaatz in which his 

forces defended against a US Navy simulated aircraft carrier attack on San Francisco. Maj Carl 

A. Spaatz to Maj T. D. Milling, letter, Fitzsimmons Army Hospital, Denver, Colo., 20 August 

1930, Spaatz Papers, box 5. Spaatz's expressed ideas on coastal defense are very similar to those 

later given by Lord Tedder. Lord Arthur Tedder, With Prejudice: The War Memoirs of Marshal 

of the Royal Air Force, Lord Tedder GCB (London: Cassell, 1966), 244. 

15 John William Ransom Taylor, Combat Aircraft of the World: From 1909 to the Present 

(New York: Putnam. 1969), 453, 476. 

16 DeWitt S. Copp, A Few Great Captains (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1980), 439. 

17 Taylor, 489-90. 

18 Finney, 36. 

19 Kennett in Cooling, ed, Case Studies in the Development of Close Air Support. 48. 

20 It seems likely that Eisenhower had more than American arrogance to worry about in his 

effort to preserve allied cooperation. Solly Zuckerman, From Apes to Warlords: The 

Autobiography (1904-1946) of Solly Zuckerman (New York: Harper & Row, 1978), 204, 

recollects, 

After lunch on a day when Mary Coningham was with us, Tooey (Spaatz) led us 

there (to his quarters) to discuss an idea which had struck him. Mary, the 

successful Commander of the Desert Air Force, was not titularly under Tooey's 

command. But he had no great respect for his new superior. I doubt if he ever 

took the trouble to find out that however determined and obstinate he could be, 

Tooey was one of the kindest, most modest and most generous of men. Without a 

word, Mary suddenly got up and moved into the garden where we could see him 

picking blossoms from a hibiscus bush. He then returned and bent down on one 

knee in front of Tooey saying, as he proffered the flowers, “Master, I bring you 

these,” Tooey was not amused. He knew well enough that the gesture was Mary's 

way of indicating that he had nothing to learn from an American general who had 

been in the war for less than a year. It was the first occasion on which I saw 

personal Anglo-American relations go wrong at that level. 

Lord Tedder was much more discreet in his public life, but certainly was not free of any 

annoyance, remarking in Tedder, 160-61, 209: 
60

Notes 

I could not deny that by now the charms of General Brett's company were 

beginning to pall. After a talk with him on the afternoon of 25 September I 

wondered in my journal how he and all the American visitors could lay down the 

law about things of which they knew next to nothing. ...I hoped, but without 

undue confidence, that Brett was not going to make trouble. I feared that he 

suffered from the apparently not uncommon American complaint of going off at 

half-cock with sweeping criticisms and proposals. ...And Finally. ...Indeed, the 

only bright patch in the clouds (after Pearl Harbor) was that the Americans openly 

said that they would no longer go about telling us how to do our job. ...(after 

another visit with General Brett) ...I gathered that all our Americans were not 

quite so convinced now that they knew all about everything. This, at least, was a 

relief. 

It appears that Tedder was no more entranced with Carl Spaatz's company. According to 

Vincent Orange, in the privacy of his correspondence with Chief of the Air Staff Air Chief 

Marshal Portal, he complained that American nationalism was disruptive. Tedder thought that 

much of the trouble came from Spaatz himself, and from the congenial but incompetent people 

he kept around him. He reported that Spaatz himself was an incompetent and a “paranoid” 

Dutchman, and regretted that he, Tedder, had to consume so much of his own time “jollying” the 

American general. Orange, 165. 

21 In the wake of the disappointments in the air battle over Vietnam, both the Navy in its Top 

Gun Program and the USAF in its Red Flag Effort at Nellis AFB implemented the relearned 

lesson-that the first 10 missions are the most dangerous by far. Red Flag is explicitly dedicated to 

provide as close a simulation of those first 10 combat missions as is possible in a training 

environment. The expense of building these two ranges and training programs was very 

substantial, but the Top Gun effort was on the line soon enough to have had discernable results in 

the last part of the Vietnam War, and all reports assert that the outcomes of Red Flag have also 

been substantial. Briefing, USAF Fighter Weapons School, Nellis AFB, Nev., 2 June 1992. 

22 Gen Elwood R Quesada, interview, 1975, Military History Institute, Carlisle Barracks, 

Pa., Quesada Papers; History, USAAF, 33d Fighter Group, January 1941-3 April 1943, AFHRA, 

GP-33-HI, 31-7; Gen William W. Momyer, interviewed by Lt Col John N. Dick Jr., 31 January 

1977, AFHRA, K239.0512-1068. It is often written, as with Colonel Scales's complaint above, 

that as a result of inadequate American air-ground doctrine, forces arrived before the battle at 

Kasserine without aircraft optimized for the work. Scales speaks of the Stuka as some sort of 

ideal. If the RAF was the senior partner on the Allied side, then one would suppose that its 

appropriate doctrine would have resulted in such dedicated aircraft, but it did not. The Western 

Desert Air Force was equipped with the same Spitfires and Hurricanes that had been built for air 

defence. Neither was all that impressive in the ground attack role; neither had much loiter time, 

both had liquid-cooled engines, the Spitfire came in without any bomb racks, and the early 

models came with .303 caliber guns. Clearly, the American P-40 of the day was not the match of 

the Spitfire or the Bf 109 in air fighting, but it did come with bomb racks and its guns were the 

.50 caliber type. Lord Tedder's memoirs are shot through with complaints that the Americans 

were not staying up with their delivery schedule of Kittybombers to the Western Desert Air 

Force. The Americans did deploy an airplane that they had tried to optimize for ground attack, 

the A-20, arguably having done as good a service as the Stuka. The Stuka had been quickly 
61

Notes 

driven out of the Battle of Britain because of its vulnerability, and it was largely confined to the 

Russian front in the latter stages of the war. Whatever the doctrinal connection with technology, 

it does not appear that the Luftwaffe or the RAF did a whole lot better than the Air Corps when it 

comes to specialized equipment for cooperation with the ground forces. Tedder, 78, 271, 272, 

280, 315, 342, 343, 347; see also Taylor, 177-78, 386-89, 426-32, 487-90. 

23 Correlli Barnett. The Desert Generals (Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana University Press, 1960, 

1982), 272. Arthur Coningham himself (whose relationship with Montgomery soured 

considerably after El Alamein) has remarked. “lf it hadn't been for the landing in Tunisia, 

Rommel would have met the other Germans and we would have been sent flying back to Egypt. 

Once Monty had his reputation, he would never risk it again.” Later the interviewer, Forrest 

Pogue, remarked that Coningham “Thinks Monty's feeling was (and one in which many British 

shared) that the British strength was ebbing in comparison with the American, and that as the 

war went on, the Americans would show up well and it would seem that the British, who had 

suffered so many times. would have to eat humble pie again.” Air Marshal Sir Arthur 

Coningham, interviewed by F. C. Pogue, 14 February 1947. U.S. Army Military History Institute 

Archives, Carlisle Barracks. Pa., Office of the Chief of Military History Collection. 

24 Morris Janowitz, The Professional Soldier: A Social and Political Portrait Leadership 

(Glencoe. Ill.: Free Press, 1960), 79-101. 

25 Bradley and Blair, 125-33; Stephen E. Ambrose, Eisenhower, vol. 1. Soldier, General of 

the Army, President Elect, 1890-1952 (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1983), 179-84. How the 

United States became transformed from being the ideological leader of the Third World into 

being its most hated enemy for having taken up the torch for the imperial powers in World War 

II, especially those in the Mediterranean, is explained. Scott L. Bills. “The United States. NATO, 

and the Colonial World.” in Lawrence S. Kaplan and Robert W. Clawson, eds. NATO After 

Thirty Years (Wilmington, Del.: Scholarly Resources, 1981), 149-64. 

26 Martin Blumenson, Kasserine Pass (New York: Jove, 1983), 90-96; Howe, Northwest 

Africa, 373-76; Dwight D. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe (New York: Da Capo, 1948. 1977), 

135-36. 

27 The official history of the USAAF remarks that “the NAAF incorporated the principles of 

air warfare which had been learned in the Middle East and demonstrated more recently by hard 

experience in Tunisia. ...The outstanding exponents of Middle East Doctrine now held key 

positions in the new setup: Tedder as head of Mediterranean Air Command and Coningham at 

Northwest African Tactical Air Force.” Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 164, “Maori 

Coningham was the first man whose force of personality and performance established that 

(centralized command of tactical air at the theater level by a coequal and collocated air 

commander) as a principal [sic) and the Army was willing to accept it.” Quesada interview, 

1975, 32, Gen Carl A. Spaatz is less direct, but he does occasionally credit the RAF for some 

lessons for the USAAF and especially for some assistance in educating our own ground officers. 

He also remarked that the British had some things to learn from the USAAF. Gen Carl A Spaatz, 

North Africa, to Gen Henry H. Arnold, Washington, letter, 24 May 1943, Spaatz Papers, box 11. 

28 Tedder, 388. 

29 Gen Carl A. Spaatz, “Leaves from My Battle of Britain Diary,” Air Power Historian 4 

(Spring, 1957): 66-75. Incidentally, General Spaatz made a telling comment about his view of 

the problem: “It takes close coordination with the Army to achieve the maximum misuse of air 
62

Notes 

power.” Spaatz, “Diary of Brigadier General Carl Spaatz on Tour of Duty in England.” Spaatz 

Papers. box 7. 

30 Spaatz to Arnold, letter, 24 May 1943. 

31 Ibid. 

32 Ibid. Spaatz expressed an early view of the current notion that armies could sometimes be 

the supporting rather than the supported force. 

33 Gen Carl A. Spaatz, interviewed by Alfred Goldberg, 19 May 1965. Historical Research 

Agency, K239.0512-755, 34. The system set up by Eisenhower and Spaatz persisted for most of 

the time since the end of World War II. Only in 1992 was the combat airpower of the USAF 

again concentrated in a single command in the new Air Combat Command, which like the GHQ 

AF was based at Langley AFB. Even at that, some air units remain assigned to the commanders 

in chief of the overseas theaters. 

34 From 7-12 February 1918. Spaatz was assigned to temporary duty with the 11th Wing of 

the Royal Flying Corps. US Army Air Service, Form 213, “Personal Report-officers,” February 

1918, Xerox copy in possession of David R Mets. 

35 Alfred F. Hurley, Billy Mitchell: Crusader for Air Power (Bloomington. Ind.: Indiana 

University Press, 1964, 1975), 24-25; Mrs. Carl A. Spaatz, interviewed by David R Mets, 25 

March 1982, 27 June 1982, and 12 April 1984, transcripts in possession of David R Mets. 

36 Craven and Cate. Torch to Pointblank, 160; Daniel R Mortensen, Pattern for Joint 

Operations: World War II Close Air Support. North Africa (Washington. D.C.: Office of Air 

Force History and US Army Center of Military History, 1987) 70: Hallion, 170-71. 

37 Ambrose, 230-31. 

38 Charles B. MacDonald, The Mighty Endeavor: The American War in Europe (New York: 

Da Capo. 1969, 1986), 138. MacDonald, an eminent Army official historian, provides evidence 

on the persistence of the attitude that FM 100-20 was not as persuasive as Laurence Kuter 

thought: “Only once during the day did American fighter planes appear, and they retreated 

quickly [during the Kasserine battle). It was an all too common example of a lack of 

coordination between forces that fought on the ground and those that fought in the air. American 

airmen at this stage in the war saw their role in only one dimension: they had a calling to defeat 

the enemy's air forces, a strategic assignment; the tactical mission of supporting their own troops 

on the ground inspired little consideration.” [128] Coming from such prominent scholars as Dr. 

Alfred Goldberg and Lt Col Donald Smith, recent and not infrequent assertions make it difficult 

to reject the following glum view: “Since close air support is the point where the Army and the 

Air Force have their most intimate and important operational connection and relationship, it is 

perhaps inevitable that the problem exists, that it is a source of great concern, and that it now 

receives prompt and thorough scrutiny from both services. Nevertheless, or perhaps therefore, all 

efforts to resolve the close air support issue have been unavailing.” and later. “This is a 

fundamental divergence which has always existed and defies resolution because it is instinctive, 

rooted in the experience and psychology of the respective services.” Army-Air Force Relations: 

The Close Support Issue, RAND Report, R-906-PR (Santa Monica, Calif., 1971), 39, 43. 

39 Philip G. Cochran speaks of having no radar at all, with pilots' quarters sometimes a 45-

minute walk away from the field and with no ground transportation available. Philip G. Cochran, 

interviewed by Office of the Assistant Chief of Air Staff, Intelligence, 28 June 1943, HRA, No. 

142.034-2. 
63

Notes 

40 Gen Carl A. Spaatz, North Africa, to Gen Henry H. Arnold, Washington, letter, 7 March 

1943, Spaatz Papers, box 11; Spaatz to Arnold, letter, 24 May 1943. 

41 Col Steward W. Towle, USAAF VIII Fighter Command. “Report on North African 

Mission” (Colorado Springs. Colo.: USAF Academy Library. 10 April 1943). Special 

Collections, James Parton Papers, box 1; History. USAAF 33d Fighter Group. January 1941-5 

April 1943, HRA. GP-33-HI. 

42 Williamson Murray, Strategy for Defeat: The Luftwaffe, 1933-1945 (Maxwell AFB, Ala.: 

Air University Press, 1983). 159-65. 

43 Spaatz noted the importance of seizing terrain suitable for both airfields and radar close to 

the battleground, Spaatz to Arnold, letter, 7 March 1943. 

44 Gen Carl A. Spaatz, North Africa, to Gen Henry H. Arnold, Washington, letter, 18 

February 1943, Spaatz Papers, box 10, General Eisenhower commented on the difficulties in 

transporting airfield construction materials, Gen Dwight D. Eisenhower, North Africa, to Gen 

Henry H. Arnold, Washington, letter, 21 November 1942, Eisenhower Library. Abilene, Kans., 

Pre-Presidential Files, box 5 (hereafter cited as Eisenhower Papers), Eisenhower, 148. 

45 Craven and Cate. Torch to Pointblank, 58-60, 750; Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea 

Cate, The Army Air Forces in World War II, vol. 6, Men and Planes (1955; new imprint, 

Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 1983) 614-628; “Training and Simulation: 

Filling the Missing Link.” Jane's Defence Weekly, 13 April 1991, 606-09; Lon O. Nordeen Jr., 

Air Warfare in the Missile Age (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1985), 44, 75, 

209; Air Vice Marshal J. R. Walker, Air Superiority Operations (London: Brassey's, 1989), 157. 

46 Richard G. Davis, Tempering the Blade: General Carl Spaatz and American Tactical Air 

Power in North Africa, November 8, 1942-May 14, 1943 (Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force 

History, 1989), 86-91. 

47 Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, 116-17. 

48 MacDonald, 125. 

49 Alan Gropman, Industrial College of the Armed Forces, “How Much Aerospace Force Is 

Enough for the New World 'Order'?” speech, USAF Deputy Chief of Staff for Plans Conference, 

Washington, D.C., 16 March 1993. 

50 In the privacy of his diary, Eisenhower expressed reservations about Spaatz's leadership 

capability, but he cites Spaatz's value as a member of an allied team. Dwight D. Eisenhower, The 

Eisenhower Diaries (New York: Norton, 1981), 94-5. Publicly, Eisenhower is explicit in saying 

that he brought Spaatz down to Africa to coordinate between the Allied air forces, and he implies 

that Doolittle was not doing very well in that task. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, 122. 

51 Gen William W. Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars (Washington, D.C.: Office of Air 

Force History, 1978). 

52 Davis, 110-20, 

53 Mortensen, A Pattern for Joint Operations, 74-77. 
The Legend of Laurence Kuter 

Agent for Airpower Doctrine 

Daniel R. Mortensen 

Of many operational and organizational problems and issues that carne to the forefront in 

the first Allied campaign Operation Torch in Northwest Africa, November 1942 to May 1943-

one persistently grips Air Force attention: Who commands the air units that support surface 

forces? It was no different in 1943 from the way it is today. Control is a focal issue whenever air 

and ground forces operate together. Earlier histories maintain that the early failures of Torch, 

especially the Battle of Kasserine Pass, can be blamed on ground leaders who, in controlling air 

resources, failed to listen to their airmen and failed to apply modern air principles in the early 

campaign against the Axis forces. 

The story continues, some parts glazed in myth, that the British came to the rescue. With

their battle-tested insights, they convinced harried American ground commanders to change the 

way air warfare was organized and fought. Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder, leader of 

Middle East Air Forces, and Air Vice Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham, commander of the 

operational Western Desert Air Forces that fought Rommel, are best remembered in this advisory 

capacity. On the other side of the Allied aisle, tradition has it that Brig Gen Laurence S. Kuter,

inveterate promoter of Air Force independence who served as a deputy to Coningham in Tunisia 

from February to April 1943, absorbed new concepts for tactical air organization and practices. 

On returning to Washington, Kuter organized these key ideas into a formal doctrine that, among 

lesser issues, proclaimed equality between air and ground commanders and described a priority 

system for the employment of tactical aviation. 

Convention has it that Kuter successfully promoted a new measure of air equality, 

expanding the influence of airmen relative to ground commanders. Army Chief of Staff George 

C. Marshall, not one to instigate changes that might threaten traditional command relationships, 

was persuaded, according to popular accounts, to accept the change because of intense British 

sponsorship. It has often been alleged that he gave quick approval to a dramatic new doctrine 

published in July 1943 as FM 100-20, Command and Employment of Air Power. 

Kuter knew as well as anyone that publication of doctrine alone would not settle the issues, 

and he remained an active sponsor and promoter of FM 100-20 for many years after the war. 

Gradually, the lessons of Africa became a fixed underpinning for basic Air Force doctrine. For a

long time, Command and Employment of Air Power codified and fostered Air Force independent 

command arrangements and certain favored concepts, such as air mission priorities and 

centralized air command, even after they ceased to reflect official doctrine. Several generations 

of Air Force officers have been reminded of the connections among independence, proper air 

practices, and North Africa in 1943. 

On the other hand, historical research has suggested for years that conditions in North Africa 

were similar to those facing the early Korean defensive operations later memorialized as “Task 

Force Smith.” 1

 The lesson, seemingly an oxymoron on reflection, was that a quickly puttogether, under-equipped military force, with untried and inadequately trained men sent out to 

64 
fill a vital but nebulous defensive position, will suffer an embarrassing defeat if that force comes 

face-to-face with a tough and competent enemy force.” The vaunted American running, 

resourcefulness, and bravery were not enough in North Africa; nor were they enough in Korea. 

Today, Americans don’t want to fight unless they have a superior edge. 

Careful studies of events in Africa show fewer problems with the air-ground relationshipand with control-than official histories record. Airmen at headquarters and airmen in the field 

were, by plan, already practicing a high degree of independent, centralized command when

Torch started. Other procedures, particularly air superiority goals, were not neglected-they were 

simply unattainable in early 1943. Air leaders therefore put their effort towards a variety of 

missions to stem the tide until sufficient American resources could be transported to North. That 

left the situation open to criticism from unappreciative successors. 

Brig Gen Laurence S. Kuter 

Young and dapper, General Kuter was effective as a member of both 

the Army General Staff and the Army Air Force General Staff. 

(Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

65 
Published materials, including the official Air Force history (Craven and Cate’s sevenvolume Army Air Forces in World War II) are inconsistent and misleading: They depict

background events that account for the development of new tactical doctrine. Evidence clearly 

indicates that Kuter did not write FM 100-20. The ideas expressed there did not originate with 

him, although he did make a hard claim to them. His specialty was airpower promotion in 

Washington, and his firsthand experience in Africa gave him credibility. If it is true that strategic 

planning in Washington should accurately reflect theater or field planning, then Washington did 

a questionable service by producing and imposing FM 100-20. The doctrine was more suited to

service promotion than to practical application. 

The celebrated manual did not reflect accurately British or American practices or principlescertainly not precisely the practices of American air commanders in Africa, Europe, or the

Pacific. For example, the British held strongly to the importance of centralized air command and 

air superiority, but they praised flexibility rather than priority in field applications. As David

Spires’s study on Weyland and Patton in northwest Europe suggests, neither the principles of 

equality nor the system of combat priorities played so simply in the field, no matter their great 

importance in furthering the importance of aviation in American force structure. 2

 A brief

descriptive analysis of essential events in both Torch and the policy process at the War

Department, filtered through new source materials, will help put the historiographic problem in 

perspective and illuminate some of our misunderstandings about FM 100-20. 

Operation Torch 

Allied powers-American, British, and French-did not mask their very intense national selfawareness and sensitivity about cooperation in Operation Torch. The intensity was evident in

deliberations about organization, doctrine, and operational planning made during Torch’s 

lifetime: from August 1942 when the American military leaders grudgingly accepted the British

proposal for a campaign in Northwest Africa, to May 1943 when sizable Axis forces surrendered 

in Tunisia. A number of agreements among the Allies compromised distinctive national agendas 

during that period, none more evident than the British agreement to have the inexperienced Lt 

Gen Dwight D. Eisenhower, commander of Allied forces in Northwest Africa, serve as theater 

commander. That agreement was instituted more for America’s massive contribution of forces 

and materials than for Eisenhower’s leadership qualities. Eisenhower had yet to demonstrate that 

he had any combat skills at all. 3

 

The decision, late in the planning, to make three simultaneous amphibious landings (at 

Casablanca, Oran, and Algeria) temporarily interrupted plans that called for a centralized

command of air resources. Units attached to Twelfth Air Force just after it was officially 

“constituted” on 20 August 1942 were separated into three segments, one subcommand for each 

landing. Planning documents made it clear that Brig Gen James H. Doolittle would regain 

control over his Twelfth Air Force units when effective communications facilities, denied by the

separated amphibious landings, were established. 

As it happened, some ground commanders who had argued against centralized air command 

threatened a postlanding problem with their published plans. Contrary to commonly held views, 

Eisenhower understood and promoted the centralized command of air resources, and he 

obligingly backed his conviction when Maj Gen George S. Patton demanded a permanent 

apportionment of air units for his own division’s purposes after the landings were made secure. 4

 

66 
Tense dialogue over control of air resources continued after the landings, exacerbated by

terribly deficient postlanding plans. Torch planners had not carefully considered contingency 

planning for a potential follow-on battle. That was made clearly evident when existing Allied

forces failed to stand up to the sudden and dramatic enemy reaction in the Mediterranean. 

Fierce battles and rapidly evolving conditions made monitoring by headquarters difficult. 

Countless observers who came to Africa recorded contradictory reports that were collectively 

useless for evaluating and adjusting existing doctrine for follow-on battles. Postlanding plans 

stipulated that a moderate British force composed of commandos and parachute troops would 

move quickly into Tunisia to capture the northern port cities, thus preventing their use as a 

logistical base for the Axis. If all went well, a British division would follow the commandos into

Tunis and Bizerte, move southward through Tunisia, and then turn eastward into Libya to apply 

pressure against Erwin Rommel, who was then in full retreat toward Tunisia before

Montgomery’s Eighth Army. 

5

 

In general, American forces were scheduled to remain in the rear. For example, Eisenhower 

positioned a small, northward-pointing force against the Spanish Morocco border to protect the 

Allied rear against a possible Axis invasion south through Spain and across the Mediterranean

into Spanish Morocco. For the most part, he directed American energy to the construction of a 

secure logistical base in Casablanca and a resumption of training for the many inadequately 

prepared air and ground units assigned to Torch. 6

 

It is useful to view the struggle for Tunisia as three distinct combat phases. The first was the 

initial race for control of Tunisia. Powerful, carefully maneuvering Germans, intent on holding 

Tunisia as a bridgehead, altered Allied expectations for an easy conquest. Eisenhower responded 

by forwarding as many troops as logistically possible, but it was a race won by the Axis, who 

had more adept, not necessarily more numerous, forces at the point of contact. On the Allied 

side, it was initially, and for the most part, a British-run campaign; the British officer, General 

Anderson, served as Eisenhower’s field commander. Some American ground and air forces were 

drawn into the battle, but the British, with their long interest in North Africa and with 

Montgomery chasing Rommel to his apparent destruction, wanted to claim the prize which 

seemed well within their grasp, at least in November-December 1942. As events turned out,

Anderson’s forces, although reinforced with all possible speed, were stalemated in the mountains 

west of Tunis and Bizerte until April 1943. 7

 

Allied forces in Northwest Africa were not in a favorable military situation in early January 

1943 when Carl A. Spaatz summoned Brig Gen Laurence S. Kuter, currently commander of the 

1st Bombardment Wing of the Eighth Bomber Command in England, to Algiers to help 

coordinate air units widely separated and weakly connected by centralized command. 

Eisenhower saw his frontline ground forces getting beaten up and port facilities all along Algeria 

bombed regularly by an active enemy air force. Fearful that he had insufficient air capability to

defeat the Axis air forces, he clamored to his superiors in London and Washington to expand the 

Allied air commitment, and he counseled Spaatz to improve coordination of his air resources that 

were, in fact, greater in number than the enemy's. 

Spaatz and most other senior American airmen believed the problem to be more complex 

than one of just numbers and centralized command. Operations thus far clearly confirmed three 

important points about airpower: One, in modern war, unprepared forces cannot use the 

battlefield for operational training when facing an experienced enemy, as the Allies were doing 

in Northwest Africa; and two, the economy of force principle applies to aviation because it is a 

vulnerable combat commodity and is best used in measured fashion for important tasks. Three, 

67 
neither ground nor air forces can operate effectively without air superiority. American airmen 

had been saying as much for years, but the point was especially effective coming from the

British, who could authenticate their principles with battlefield successes. 

The victorious British air leaders, Tedder and Coningham, pressured Eisenhower through 

November and December to institute operational modifications, the most important being a

centralized, combined, Allied air command for the Mediterranean theater. 8

 In late December,

Eisenhower agreed with Tedder to centralize Allied air forces, including centralized control of 

tactical aviation over the battlefield; but he asked for time to give American commanders, both 

air and ground, some additional experience to validate their own evolving tactical air doctrine.

He had already shown the airmen that he would champion centralized air forces under his 

command (that idea had long been an option for him), and it was behind Spaatz’s summons to 

Kuter to help him coordinate Northwest Africa air resources. 9

 

Eisenhower and Spaatz understood that American and British air operations proposed for 

North Africa in 1943 were almost entirely tactical, organized to support the dominant military 

concern of the Mediterranean; that is, the ground campaigns. They most certainly recognized that 

command and control constituted the most vital factor in defining the limits and capabilities of

tactical aviation. Anytime different kinds of forces combined, whether it be archers with armored 

knights, artillery with infantry, cavalry with foot soldiers, or armor and infantry with aircraft, 

control was a problem and an issue. 

Eisenhower and Spaatz recognized several basic variables that influenced effective 

command of their forces, including geography and distance, the incomplete training of their own 

forces compared to the training given the enemy, the factors of interservice and Allied

competition, personality traits, and the control system itself. As one student noted, “beyond raw 

capabilities, the most fundamental requirement...is an effective control process.” 10 When faced

with a powerful enemy, the advantage of coordinating one’s available strength better than the 

enemy can be decisive. Such coordination requires effective commanders and adequate 

communications systems to integrate the operators with gathered intelligence. Air leaders had 

long argued that only an accomplished could execute the very specialized function of air 

command. It was beyond the experience of most ground force commanders. 

Coningham made a point to emphasize all the above factors, but he gave special 

acknowledgment to the influence of personality as a key factor in centralized air command. 

Effective command was based on a principle of “mutual respect for each other’s capabilities and 

limitations.” 11 Spaatz recognized that the personality factor underlay the effectiveness of

Montgomery and Coningham, and he passed on to Arnold his belief that “proper coordination of 

air effort with ground effort depends to a large extent on the personalities of the commanders.” 12

It helped when old friends were on either end of a command line, particularly at the top level 

where decisions were made, often with insufficient feedback from the battlefield. 

Wanting independent American forces engaged in battle despite all the problems associated

with their use, Eisenhower started a second phase of the battle for Tunisia in early January. He

decided that the small force of Americans then holding a quiet section of the battlefield on 

Anderson’s southern flank should be expanded in order to continue the threat against Rommel’s 

rear. The new American field force, commanded by II Corps commander, Maj Gen Lloyd 

Fredendall, with supporting American and French air units, was just getting into position when it 

too was threatened by a larger and experienced Axis force. 

In mid-February, while frantically building their forces, Americans got caught between Gen 

Jüergen von Arnim, who had moved a large force from the north, and Rommel, who had taken 

68 
up a position in southern Tunisia more quickly than expected. This period centered on the

famous Battle of Kasserine Pass, where American ground units were defeated and pushed 

backward for several days before they were able, with British help, to stop the Axis attack. The

air forces played only a minor part because bad weather kept most planes grounded. This second

phase was seen as a clear defeat for the Americans. Important, however, is the fact that this

embarrassing episode opened many of their minds to doctrinal revision. 13 

The third phase dated from late February, with Montgomery’s victorious forces pushing up 

behind Rommel in southern Tunisia; it ended in May 1943 with an Allied victory. The 

conceptual mother of this final combat phase in Tunisia was the Casablanca Conference in 

January. Allied leaders there agreed to a common focus, with creation of a dramatic grand 

organization having a shared Allied command framework that would serve as a model for the

rest of the war in Europe. Eisenhower had agreed to the new organization in January, but he 

delayed its implementation. With American forces stalemated and Montgomery’s army closing 

up, he could no longer delay combining his American forces with those of the British. He 

relinquished direct control of ground, air, and sea forces to British command. The Americans 

also compromised when they accepted the plan to invade Sicily and Italy in mid-1943, thus 

continuing their involvement in the Mediterranean campaign rather than turning to an invasion of 

northwest Europe, which was their original aspiration. 14 

The Kasserine Pass debacle and Casablanca Conference precipitated support for some

important American air ideas for conduct of the war in Europe. With respect to strategic

bombing, airmen argued and won acceptance of a plan to run an independent segment of the 

“combined bomber offensive against northwest Europe.” Important for tactical air matters, the 

airmen argued for central command of tactical air units wherever or whatever the campaign or

battle: at least they won Eisenhower’s support when he agreed that the new air doctrine “should 

function very much along principles previously in operation with 8th Army and Alexandria.” 15 

Eisenhower’s assertive executive, Brig Gen Walter Bedell Smith, as well as Spaatz, 

Doolittle, and Gen H. H. Arnold, participated in the conceptual debate. The individuals who 

garnered the greatest celebrity on the matter, however, were two airmen who spoke so urgently 

on the matter: the American, Kuter, and the New Zealander, Air Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham,

known to his friends as “Mary.” 

Coningham and Kuter 

Neither Coningham nor Kuter gained, at least in American eyes, the grand celebrity status 

granted to their colleagues in Africa-Eisenhower, Tedder, Montgomery, Patton, and Doolittle, to 

name the most obvious. However, working behind the scenes, refining doctrinal bulkheads, and 

putting words in the mouths of their service chiefs, Coningham and Kuter benefited American

and British air organizations. Their efforts helped establish doctrine that supported more 

efficient, effective, and expert air force control over tactical air resources, an arrangement that 

eventuated in a less abusive treatment of air units working with surface forces. 

Even before he gained a great reputation as innovative commander of Allied tactical air 

forces in the Tunisian campaign, Coningham had acquired deserved recognition and glory in 

victorious operations of the Western Desert Air Forces before and during the successful pursuit

of Rommel. No matter how his victory was analyzed or deflated-that the Germans lacked a 

significant air force, or that the Italians had a large air force but did not know how to operate it, 

69 
or that Coningham had the help of a sizable contingent of American air units-Coningham was a

winner: he was the operational leader of the air contingent in a successful military campaign. 

Operational policies and practices employed by Coningham in the Western Desert in 1941 

and 1942, before the Tunisian campaign, became the model for tactical practices in Europe and

much influenced modem American tactical aviation. The republication of Vincent Orange’s 

Coningham: A Biography of Air Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham makes available the most

comprehensive account of Coningham’s command. Nothing was more important than command 

location. When he went forward to command air operations in 1941, Coningham, on the advice

of Tedder, solicited the army commander to share a common, centralized operational command 

post. Successful in that entreaty, Coningham was able, through careful and patient nurturing, to

develop intimate relations with the ground commanders. In his mind, those close relations 

increased the effectiveness of air and ground operations. 16 

Coningham gave great credit to that arrangement, but he claimed on occasion that he had to

fight for operational practices different from those favored by Montgomery and his subordinate 

staff officers and corps commanders. In addition, as with the American air-ground relationship, 

and no matter that the RAF was a separate service, British ground commanders occasionally 

believed they could run the air force more efficiently than their airmen could. Coningham was in 

the desert in September 1941 when Churchill intervened in an argument about fighters flying

combat patrols over the army positions as desired and requested by infantry leaders. Churchill 

came down on the side of the airmen, stating categorically that “the ground forces must not

expect ‘as a matter of course’ to be protected against aerial attack.” Coningham also insisted that 

the air component commander in a ground campaign be coequal to the ground commander, one 

not serving the other. The ground commander would have need to identify some missions, but 

the airman would determine his own reaction to these takings. 17 

Coningham included the exercise of good relations with ground commanders in a primer 

underscoring requirements for successful tactical aviation, and he spent considerable energy 

training his own subordinate units, providing them with the latest techniques to ensure that their 

efforts would be truly effective. For example, he activated a formal system of liaison office 

exchanges between the services, a practice not carefully administered by air commanders who 

preceded him. He identified the need for dedicated transportation, especially trucks for his 

mobile support forces, as well as air crews. Army transportation personnel had on occasion 

assigned a low priority to servicing the airmen, easily done in the heat of battle. Coningham also 

identified the basic need for effective communications facilities and radar to help direct and 

conserve air resources in defensive and offensive operations with a capable enemy. In a strong 

message to army generals, Coningham proclaimed that military forces were doomed to failure 

without these basic conditions. 18 

Coningham gave a particular twist to the problem of air superiority, one the Americans 

would later misinterpret but one in fact couched very much in the tradition of battlefield 

flexibility, a principle of special application to airpower. Appreciating the importance of supply 

in desert warfare, Coningham advocated that a high priority be given for bombing attacks against 

enemy airfields, ports, and shipping. In October, during the chase of Rommel, he made enemy

interdiction targets the primary tasking. While he thought air superiority a basic mission and 

organized his forces to attain general dominance over enemy air before the ground combat 

began, he found occasions to relax air superiority missions and fill target folders with enemy 

shipping, ports, and other portions of the transportation system. 19 

70 
Kuter, the epitome of a headquarters type with very limited operational experience, did not 

have much in common with Coningham. But he did have the good fortune to be in Northwest 

Africa and be appointed the American contingent’s deputy commander to Coningham’s 

Northwest African Tactical Air Force (NATAF). In that post, he would learn from the best and

witness the first success of the American forces-those that joined battle with the British to win 

the struggle for Tunisia. 

Kuter is a known figure to most airpower historians. He was one of the authors of AWPD-l

(1941), which gave the Army Air Forces the strategic air mission, a largely autonomous 

assignment that pointed toward service independence. He is commonly, but wrongly, credited 

with authorship of FM 100-20 (July 1943), the primary tactical air doctrinal statement issued by 

the War Department. a publication also associated with air independence. He has been described 

as “rakishly good-looking, resembling a thin John Gilbert, articulate, bright, ambitious and much 

favored by Marshall.” He also is generally identified in World War II as a “personal staff planner 

for Hap Arnold.” How did he get there? 

Kuter graduated from the Military Academy in 1927, showing no special interest in aviation. 

He joined the Field Artillery and. because of his class position at the academy, won an 

assignment to the prime facility, the Presidio in San Francisco. At an artillery exercise where he 

took his battery out to shoot up the landscape, he received such poor information from spotting

aircraft that he asked to go to flight school to improve spotting, thus making him a better 

artilleryman. Flying took his breath away, and he soon found himself following the normal Air

Corps pilot training schedule. In 1930, after getting his wings and receiving special training as a

bombardment pilot, he transferred from Field Artillery into the Air Corps. 

In 1933 he became operations officer for the 2d Bomb Wing at Langley. He flew as an 

alternate with Claire Chennault’s acrobatic group; led the operational development of the B-9, 

the Air Corps’ first taste of strategic bombers; helped run the airmail service and was detained to

write the history of the debacle; won top honors at the Air Corps Tactical School in 1935 and 

stayed on to instruct; and. in July 1939, found himself directed to Washington. Just a young 

captain, he was marked by Marshall, who had a habit of bringing bright young men into the 

General Staff. Kuter was loaned to Arnold in mid-1941 to join those writing the Victory Air Plan 

(known also as AWPD-l). Promoted to major, he went back to Marshall as assistant secretary of 

the War Department General Staff. He was one of three to write the 1941 reorganization plan for

the War Department that brought about the Army Air Forces and Arnold’s control over all 

elements of Army air. As a reward for his efforts, he received the rank of lieutenant colonel in 

January 1942. He became a brigadier general in February 1942-at 37 years of age. This was the 

sort of thing that happened in World War II. 

Kuter went back to Arnold to become deputy chief of the Air Staff. Then Arnold said it was 

time for a little operational experience and, in October 1942, Kuter was given command (with no 

previous command experience) of the 1st Bombardment Wing, Eighth Bomber Command, in

England. For three months, he directed B-17 attacks against the continent. In January troubles in 

the Torch campaign got everyone’s attention and, as one of the bright young generals overseas, 

Kuter was picked for another important post of destiny: Eisenhower appointed him commanding 

general of Allied Tactical Air Forces, a temporary position contrived to help coordinate the 

widespread air forces then fighting a losing battle against the Axis. 

Beginning mid-February 1943, in the third phase of the struggle for Tunisia, Kuter served as 

the deputy commander of NATAF, at the side of the zealous advocate of airpower, Coningham, 

who was fresh from victory over Rommel’s air forces. The final battles took but a few bloody 

71 
weeks and provided insight for all branches and services of the Army. In light of the tactical air

command’s structure and practices, Kuter found ample justification to reopen the historical

argument in the War Department about the equality of air and ground command. No matter that 

the battle was not finished in Tunisia, in April both Marshall and Arnold asked that Kuter be sent 

back to Washington to help with war planning. Before the end of April, Kuter returned to serve 

as Arnold’s special assistant. He then took over the important Air Staff doctrine office as 

assistant chief of the Air Staff for plans and combat operations. 20 

Soon after Kuter arrived in Washington, he presented a long statement of lessons learned. 

Describing and discussing the many variables that made for a successful air campaign, he

focused on centralized air command in the theater, so important in facilitating the employment of 

coastal, strategic, and tactical air forces, mixing the forces and tasks as necessary to fulfill the

long-range objective as well as current conditions. He expressed the importance of cooperation 

and cooperative attitude between air and ground commands, stating clearly that the task of the

tactical air force was “intimately concerned with the battle itself immediately in the battlefield.” 21 

Kuter took advantage of Coningham’s celebrity, giving the air marshal credit for ideas

favorable to the Army Air Forces (AAF). In a press statement, Kuter claimed that Coningham 

believed in “two distinct phases. First, the requirement that he reduce the enemy air to practical 

impotence and after that to throw the full weight of his air force against the enemy army.” Kuter 

analyzed the battle for Mareth, the strongest defensive position held by Rommel in southern

Tunisia, as a case in point: “The Mareth battle actually began with an air blitz on enemy

airdromes. ...Coningham concentrated his entire air force on the enemy airdromes.” With the 

German air force materially reduced, Coningham then used the American and northern British 

air forces exclusively against the German air, permitting full attention of the Western Desert air 

units to provide close air support for Montgomery’s Eighth Army. After Mareth was taken, 

Coningham reorganized the force structure to fit new requirements for the next phase against the 

Axis position. Kuter believed that “to win this battle, the key note in our employment of our Air 

Forces was the word ‘concentration’.” 22 

Kuter’s press statement was necessarily moderate and qualified. A few days after his public

Pentagon presentation, he gave a classified interview to Air Staff planners that was much more 

biting and finger-pointing, although he apologized for its tone, which he considered necessary to

show mistakes and operational problems. Kuter made it clear that Coningham was not perfect 

and that the British, as well as the Americans, made mistakes. 

The official histories of World War II, as well as subsequent derivative histories, record the

muckraking sentiment that Kuter expressed in this meeting, but they often exclude the qualifiers 

with which he expressed his critique. Historians have discussed Kuter’s list of sins committed by 

ground commanders, from Eisenhower on down (although no names were listed), who gave what 

airmen considered to be bad command directives to the supporting air forces operating in

Tunisia. Airmen, operating against their sense of correct practice, obeyed orders from 

subordinate army commanders who demanded air support missions over small fronts, other 

commanders who demanded expensive air caps, and yet others who ordered missions for 

obsolete bombers that were predictably shot down. The list went on, but the sentence was clear. 

To Kuter, certain air-ground practices explained why air support had failed in the opening 

months in Tunisia and why they needed to be corrected in the future. At least from the 

perspective of 50 years later, Kuter’s critique suggests a need for fine-tuning tactical air policies 

and practices, not a major overhaul of them. 23 

72 
Significant to ideas developing elsewhere, Kuter included a short comment about the 

NATAF prime mandate. “Its directive initially, and throughout the campaign as a matter of fact, 

listed as its functions: First, the defeat of the German Air Force; second, the isolation of the 

German army; third, the redirection of all striking effort against the German Army in direct 

support of the ground push forward.” This reference to priority is odd, given the fact that 

NATAF official documents, including Coningham’s official directive, do not deal with three 

equal-level priorities. Rather, they stress, as number one, “to provide maximum air support for 

land operations,” and, as two, the attainment of which “can only be achieved by fighting for and

obtaining a high measure of air supremacy.” Other air organizations in North Africa, the Coastal 

and Strategic Air Forces in particular, specialized more than NATAF in interdiction roles. Very

likely sensitized by ideas working in Washington, Kuter threw in the priority concept. It is not 

coincidence that three days after this interview, Kuter was assigned to help rewrite newly 

developed doctrinal statements. 24 

The damning list of bad command decisions Kuter brought back from Africa would not have 

had as much effect had they not come with an endorsement from a proven winner, Coningham.

For a time, Coningham helped shine a light on American tactical airmen and Kuter, the 

disciple/advocate, helped clinch the selling of the British message to the US Army. When Kuter 

argued the case on his return in mid-May, he found the soil already prepared. Marshall and his 

senior staff had already heard similar stories that corroborated Kuter’s message, and they had 

been hounded by the Air Staff for months on the necessity to rewrite some official tactical air 

doctrinal. 

Kuter gained even greater recognition when he and other air force advocates of 

independence in Washington proclaimed that combat in North Africa had shown the need to give

air support commanders independence from the ground commanders for whom they were 

providing support, and that official doctrine needed to be changed to reflect combat conditions. It 

is an old battle that went back to the 1920s in the United States. It is my contention that these 

independence advocates have been glorified without the acknowledgment due other important 

players, without the recognition of personal agendas, and most importantly, without the true 

evaluation of conditions in Tunisia. I think that, partly through self-promotion and with the aid of 

Air Force historians writing in the early 1950s, Kuter has gained undeserved credit, particularly 

for the authorship of official doctrine. On the other hand, he had an important role in

merchandising the radically new conceptual model for tactical aviation. The story can be best 

told from the perspective of events generated in the United States rather than in Africa. 

Doctrine from Headquarters 

In the winter of 1942-43, the War Department put some effort toward modernizing air 

doctrine, particularly as espoused in FM 1-5, Employment of Aviation of the Army, and FM 31-

35, Aviation in Support of Ground Forces. Air planners had an interest in strengthening the 

independence of the air commanders in war plans, but the joint deliberations necessary for the

review process upset spokesmen for ground forces. FM 1-5 has a strange history. The War

Department is said to have published it in January 1943 (at least there was a rumor to that effect), 

but copies are difficult to find. The manual appears, for reasons unknown, not to have been

distributed widely, if at all. It gave something to both sides-a compromise document when the

mood was decidedly not concessive. It recognized the central command by airmen of theater 

aviation, but it also assured allocation of aircraft to the land battle at crucial times. 25 

73 
In December 1942 discussions between planners in the Army Air Forces and Army Ground 

Forces (AGF) serving on an air support board became locked over control of specialized air 

support aircraft. The airmen wanted a rule to allow them to centralize control over all air support 

command resources; the AGF wanted aircraft delegated to subordinate commands according to 

the ground commanders’ wishes. The existing edition of FM 31-35, written the year before, 

equivocated on the issue of centralized command. With its mixed-service representation, the 

board was not susceptible to radically changed ideas for formal doctrinal statements. In January,

not wanting to force the issue and somewhat unsure of doctrine based on British experience in 

the Western Desert, Marshall postponed alterations of FM 31-35 until the Americans could gain 

combat experience. 26 

Brig Gen Orvil A. Anderson, assistant chief of the Air Staff for operation plans, who had a

dramatic sense about expanding the influence of air commanders, ordered staff officers 

specializing in air support to investigate the issue. He saw a battle rising with the ground forces 

promoters, and he began an aggressive offense. He urged the assistant commandant, Col Morton 

H. McKinnon, director of the Air Support Branch at the Army Air Forces School of Applied 

Tactics (AAFSAT) in Orlando, Florida, who was just beginning to get involved in doctrinal 

study, to pay greater attention to statements about centralizing air authority for operations. 27 

Anderson did not accept one report that commented on FM 31-35 because he thought it 

overly compromised air leaders’ command prerogatives. He believed that “full tactical command 

of air support units is vested in an Air Support Commander, responsible only to the task force or 

theater commander.” He even offered a radical idea about the air support commander not

answering to the ground field commanders-rather “advis[ing] them on all matters pertaining to 

air support.” Air planners began to rethink some of the early policies. For example, they thought 

that the practice of the air support commander responding to requests from subordinate 

commanders through complicated channels of command would result in piecemeal destruction of 

air resources. For the first time, the air staff began explicit promotion of the British ideas of full 

equality in services, even for tactical or “cooperation” air units, as the British called them, 

although at first the rhetoric was not so obviously British. 28

Maj Gen Orvil A. Anderson 

General Anderson helped push the new tactical doctrine through the 

Pentagon. (Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

74 
Capt Morton H. McKinnon 

Shown here as a captain, Col Morton H. McKinnon was the primary 

author of FM 100-20. (Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

Anderson was revolutionary in arguing that when aviation units are designated to support a 

ground force, control of the air units comes down through the theater commander to the air force

commander, what we call the air component commander (ACC) today. Doolittle was the air 

component commander in Africa at the time. The ACC, in turn, gives assignments to the 

designated air support commanders who then assign the attack missions as befits the ground 

plan. Even more radical, Anderson suggested that in cases where isolation prevents effective 

control of smaller air units by the designated air support commander, the highest unit air 

commander will control air resources-not the ground commander, as was originally stated in FM

31-35. 

As Anderson boldly stated, “Throughout all phases of allocation of Air Support Units the 

principle must be recognized that command is exercised through commanders in control of units

operating in similar media.” Just because air units are designated to close support of a 

subordinate ground unit did not imply subordination of the air unit to the ground commander. 

Anderson expected the air support commanders to consult with ground commanders regarding 

the best employment of available air resources, but “final decision as to its employment should 

rest with the Air Force or Air Support Commanders who are especially qualified and more

favorably situated in the chain of command to exploit its capabilities and minimize its

limitations.” 29 

One might expect that, for all his energy in attempting to modify a touchy and important part 

of FM 31-35, Anderson’s efforts would fail to persuade the AGF. Ground leaders had not been 

exposed to this kind of daring pronouncement about air equality at the formal level. British 

declarations about centralized air made the American airmen bold. Ground leaders certainly had 

heard airmen make such claims in social situations; it was part of interservice rivalry. Most air 

and ground officers knew it ran hard against the grain of the stereotypical field commander who 

75 
believed that all military forces were potential support resources, his for the taking. Many

holding this view put air support into the category of accompanying weapon, not independent 

force. In a normal situation, ground commanders would willingly allocate air units to many

ground units, further decentralizing control to units even smaller than a division. 

Consider the changed tendency of War Department ground officers after Marshall began 

giving greater influence to the air force leadership. If the attitude toward modifying FM 31-35 

and the disappearance of FM 1-5 are indicators, interservice toleration seemed to have waned by 

early 1943. One sign of this was the vocal contingent of staff ground officers who refused to 

accept revisions to FM 31-35 restricting ground command influence over air support resources. 

This viewpoint was strengthened as knowledge about the effectiveness of the German system of 

combined air and ground strike forces in the Battle of France came to light. The stiffening view 

of Washington ground planners gave little latitude to airmen who wanted to centralize control of

tactical air assets. Nevertheless, the issue was served, and the real question became one of testing

the persuasive power of airmen in Washington to get the changes past Marshall and the General 

Staff, not to mention Maj Gen Leslie J. McNair, commander of the AGF and chief advocate of 

the ground point of view. 30 

Gen George C. Marshall and Lt Gen H. H. Arnold 

The famous Casablanca Conference decided certain strategic and 

tactical doctrinal matters. Here, Generals Marshall and Arnold share a 

lighter moment. (Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

The dramatic theater reorganization, initiated at Casablanca on 18 February 1943, that 

coalesced American and British command structures and formally sanctioned equality between

air and ground gave airmen in Washington fuel for change. The word got to Washington from

any number of sources: the press, American air and ground commanders who had experienced 

the promotion of coequality by Montgomery and Coningham at the commanders’ conference in 

Tripoli on 16 February, and British airmen who came to the United States to pass on British

tactical aviation lessons. Still, new attempts by the airmen to incorporate command and control 

76 
changes into tactical air doctrine by modifying FM 31-35 were unsuccessful. Anderson wrote 

again to AAFSAT asking for greater effort and, subsequently, to Col W. H. Hardy, head of air 

force instruction at the Command and General Staff School, Leavenworth, Kansas, requesting 

his help. 31 

Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder and Mal Gen Carl Spaatz 

The new order after Casablanca included Chief Air Marshal Tedder as 

commander in chief of Mediterranean Air Command and General 

Spaatz as commander of Northwest Africa Air Forces. (Source: US 

Air Force) 

The shocking American defeat at Kasserine in the last weeks in February reinflamed the 

issue, compelling Washington staff members to become more receptive to the idea of 

reformation. From Africa, Spaatz forwarded his views regarding Coningham’s success and his 

plans to alter doctrine and the application of air support for ground troops. First, Spaatz sent 

Arnold a short note and a copy of Montgomery’s “Some Notes on High Command in War.” 

Montgomery had gathered his personal notes, some say borrowed from Coningham, to explain 

his success in the Western Desert; he highlighted a number of technical points, including the 

need for flexibility, mass, and centralized command of tactical air resources. 32 

A few weeks later, Spaatz sent Arnold a long report on command conditions in Africa. 

Spaatz clearly was not beguiled by Coningham’s description of how to organize and run an 

independent tactical air force, although he acknowledged problems with American air support 

forces, particularly with the fact that Allied air forces at the time were not an adequate match for 

the German air force: On the other hand, Spaatz did not believe that the situation “requires a 

peculiar form of organization.” He spoke rather to the need for air superiority, centralized forces, 

and large formations (not the small, vulnerable flights being sent out at the time) as well as the

need for other technical changes in operational methods. What of the revolutionary priority 

system for assigning missions and the coequality of air and ground commands as advocated by 

Coningham? Spaatz had no commentary on coequality in his letter to Arnold; he seemed not to 

77 
be as captivated as he once was by the idea of independence. It was a Washington issue that was 

not appropriate for the field. Neither did Spaatz comment on the priority issue; he would have 

been opposed. Since his 1941 tour in England, he had recognized the value of centralized air 

command so forces could be applied with the greatest flexibility. The object was to help the

ground, and flexibility was a primary principle of air employment. 33 

On another command issue, Spaatz was at one with Coningham; he insisted that the 

emphasis was on personality: “The proper coordination of air effort with ground effort depends 

to large extent on the personalities of the commanders.” Effective command was based on a 

principle of “mutual respect for each other’s capabilities and limitations.” Spaatz did not feel the 

need for structural changes to enforce effective air-ground coordination in combat. Independence 

was not necessary for mutual support and, further, Spaatz equivocated with Arnold on whether 

respect could be acquired “under a separate Air Force or with an Air Force under the Army.” 34 

General Anderson would have been surprised when he read Spaatz’s letter to Arnold. The

senior staff habitually circulated important field correspondence, especially a letter so clearly 

informative and oriented to leading issues. Anderson obviously found Coningham’s principles of 

outspoken advocacy more useful to Washington than Spaatz found them applicable in the 

theater. But, while Spaatz never became an advocate of Coningham’s ideas, he did not

undermine them either. He made a point of reminding Arnold that Kuter, who was with him in 

Africa at the time, was the man to explain Coningham’s tactical aviation ideas to Washington. 

Spaatz was correct when he told Arnold that Kuter’s extended experience in Africa would ensure

that “his service for you will be of a sufficiently greater value.” 35 

While conversations regarding publication of revised tactical air doctrine simmered in 

Washington through March and April, and the fountainhead of combat experience involved 

Kuter’s and Coningham’s commanding the tactical war at their mountain crossroads command 

center at Ain Beida in central Algeria, the agency for doctrinal change was the Air Support

Department at AAFSAT in far-off Orlando and the primary agent for it was Colonel McKinnon. 

Some looked at AAFSAT as a reproduction of the Air Corps Tactical School, and the record

reveals that the faculty lived up to its charge that it be a doctrinal pace setter, at least with regard

to tactical aviation. 

An early example of AAFSATs importance in the tactical doctrinal role came in the first 

days of March. The Air Staff in Washington asked McKinnon to draft a chapter for a new, 

revolutionary manual conceived by Arnold to cover all manner of operational doctrine and to be 

published as a series of pamphlets that, in loose-leaf form, could be constantly updated to match 

rapidly changing battlefield experience. McKinnon wrote “The Air Support Command.” His 

chapter was included with others in the unnumbered publication, The Air Force in Theaters of

Operations: Organization and Functions, issued in May 1943. 

In terms of tactical aviation, the manual and the section drafted by AAFSAT were quite 

conventional in adopting many of the ideas expressed in FM 31-35. Cautiously, McKinnon even 

reproduced, right out of FM 31-35, the concept about ground commanders having control of air 

resources in certain circumstances, such as when communication or distance prevented 

centralized air control. It was an idea currently under heavy attack in North African combat

circles, and in Washington as well. The air support pamphlet even continued using the term “air 

support” to describe air activities interwoven with ground combat. The British in Africa had 

already made a big issue of using the term “tactical” in place of “air support,” which they

thought denoted subservience to the ground commanders. 36 

78 
Nonetheless, The Air Force in Theaters of Operations was a significant transitional 

document that bridged ideas between FM 31-35 and FM 100-20, the latter to appear in July 

1943. It was the first published document, American or British, to articulate the three phases of 

tactical operations. McKinnon described phase I as neutralization of enemy aircraft and airdrome

installation, phase II as isolation of the battlefield, and phase III as close support of ground 

forces. 37 The original three-phase aviation priority tasking is listed below. 

Phase 1: Neutralization of Enemy Aircraft and Airdrome Installations 

Attacking airdromes 

Destruction of airplanes on the ground 

Destruction of supplies and installations Destruction of radio installations 

Attacks on enemy antiaircraft installations 

Coordinated attacks on heavily defended installations 

Phase 2: Isolation of the Battlefield 

Attacking shipping and naval targets Attacking railroads and rolling stock 

Attacking fuel, ammunition, and supply dumps 

Attacking reserves and reinforcements in concentration 

Phase 3: Close Support of Ground Forces 

Attacks against enemy defenses 

Attacks against landing parties 

Attacks against enemy personnel, weapons, and vehicles 

Destruction of roads and bridges in enemy’s line of march 

Denial of ground by use of chemicals 

Screening of action by use of smoke 

Neutralization of enemy air force 

Great creative thinking and prototype modeling continued in Orlando, with fresh ideas 

coming from Africa and Washington. In late March Coningham sent two RAF wing commanders

to Orlando to share with AAFSAT students and Air Support Department staff their experiences

with the Western Desert Air Force. More important, as events would prove, Kuter’s observations 

on operations in North Africa reached the school in early April. They arrived indirectly. From his 

command post in Algeria, Kuter sent some material to his mentor, Maj Gen Muir S. Fairchild, in 

Washington. Following the preference to involve AAFSAT in policy and doctrine, Fairchild 

forwarded the material to McKinnon at Orlando. 

Subsequently, Kuter’s description of coequality of air command became the other most 

recognizable facet of an innovative new tactical doctrine, matching the three-layered priority

concept already articulated by McKinnon at Orlando. Kuter insisted that the unsatisfactory 

organization of air support forces could be corrected by emulating the new tactical air force 

organization then in place in Africa. He briefly defined it (with the RAF clearly serving as the

model), and he offered some specific technical problems with American air support practices. He 

encouraged the emphasis of one primary principle, the importance of air superiority before 

undertaking ground missions. That was Coningham’s principle too. It was “the first job of a 

‘ground support’ air force.” At this point Kuter did not, as would later be credited to him, insist 

on mission priorities beyond air superiority for tactical planning; he did not advocate establishing 

79 
the priorities of air superiority, interdiction, and close air support. More than likely, he was 

unaware of McKinnon’s concept and the Air Staffs acceptance of it. Kuter also listed a few

minor issues that were theater specific or of little importance to McKinnon’s instructional 

institution, so far away. 38 

If he did not offer priorities, Kuter offered something far more important and which 

promised a long-term effect. He advanced the argument that American tactical air forces should 

have either a new level of air independence or equality similar to that enjoyed by the British, or 

else that they be allowed simply to behave as though they had. Kuter was the natural advocate 

for this position because shortly before he came to Europe he had been among the ringleaders 

pushing for immediate separation of the air forces from the Army. He had even drafted a 

proposal for such and asked Assistant Chief of Staff Stratemeyer to take it to Arnold and 

Assistant Secretary of War for Air Robert A. Lovett. When Lovett disapproved of any attempt 

for separation during the war, Kuter destroyed his draft proposal, but he did not give up his 

fixation to make air a separate service. 39 

Kuter got great psychological support from both Marshall and Coningham. In early 1942 

while he was working as an assistant secretary for Marshall and leading the effort to reorganize 

the War Department, he claimed that Marshall told him he wanted the Air Force as a separate 

organization, but “it was obvious that we could not operate without the support of the many 

varieties of talent and experience in the Army Service Forces.” The knowledge that he had 

support from Marshall about air independence-in fact, if not by regulation-gave him great 

confidence. Kuter received similar support from Coningham as a mentor in air independence, 

and he began to believe, with good cause, that the British policy of air and ground equality 

underlay their combat success in Africa-that the air battle was equal to the ground battle. 40 

In his letter to Fairchild, Kuter argued for independence in the field, in combat theaters. At 

the very least, airmen would command independent air forces in conjunction with each ground 

force in a theater. He insisted further that “the concept of an air ground battle where ground 

effort is given an equal weight with air effort can become an actuality only when neither the 

ground commander [n]or the air commander are subordinate to the other.” Kuter saw both 

ground and air playing a “mutually supporting role,” a major shift from traditional ground 

command roles, where air support is conceived to be an auxiliary. 41

80 
The Honorable Robert A. Lovett 

Assistant Secretary of War for Air Lovett dissuaded air leaders from 

pursuing independence during the war. (Source: National Air and 

Space Museum) 

Brig Gen Muir S. Fairchild 

General Fairchild helped the Air Staff promote a more independent 

tactical air force. (Source: US Air Force) 

At AAFSAT, the Air Support Department’s conceptualization of air support was greatly 

affected by Kuter’s argument and by a departmental review of RAF tactical aviation. The staff 

had the enviable opportunity to debate issues, test ideas on students, and write on the subject. In 

81 
effect, it served the purpose of testing and then promoting new tactical air thinking in a specific 

direction before the African experiences could be spread and absorbed by others in military 

organizations. Staff members were in a perfect place to blend Kuter’s commentaries on 

command equality with their unique ideas on mission priorities. They could test their ideas on 

students, faculty, and friends, and could even issue concepts to the field or operational 

organizations before the slower pace of publication and distribution of official doctrinal manuals 

took over. It was not long before Washington agreed that AAFSAT could help steer new doctrine 

through the Army. 

42 

In mid-April, Army Chief of Staff Marshall again got caught up in the discussions about 

revising air support doctrine to correct deficient training literature. Lovett sent Marshall a memo

on 18 April, detailing current confusion about air support employment. Citing and appending

Montgomery’s December 1942 Tripoli notes, “High Command in War,” Lovett suggested that 

Montgomery confirmed “the fundamental principles on which the reorganization of the Army 

Air Forces in June of 1941 was ordered by you with the approval and support of the Secretary of

War.” Ignoring the traditional split between air and ground over centralized command, Lovett 

also told Marshall that much of what Montgomery stated was “accepted by the Army in 

principle” but had not been “embodied in our written doctrine.” Regardless of the War 

Department division over air support, the opportunity to champion the air doctrine concept came

from the top down, supported by Lovett, the civilian air leader, and by Marshall, the military

leader. 43 

On 24 April 1943, a few days after the Lovett memo, Marshall delegated Assistant Chief of 

Staff, Organization and Training Division (G-3), Maj Gen Ray E. Porter to investigate the 

matter. Prompt by military bureaucratic standards, other branches of the General Staff (G-3 and 

Operations Division [OPD] included) and Maj Gen Jacob L. Devers, commander of armored 

forces in Fort Knox, Kentucky, agreed by letter and memo that the British method should be 

taken into account in an air support doctrine manual. Marshall suggested in rewriting the new

manual that the phrase “correct employment of air power” should be used. His letter of 

instruction gave particulars of what the new manual should say, including the Montgomery 

rhetoric, “Land power and air power are coequal and interdependent forces, neither is an

auxiliary of the other.” Marshall’s letter of instruction, obviously written by an airman aware of 

operational ideas in Africa, also reiterated the importance of gaining air superiority, air power’s

“inherent flexibility,” and that “control of available air power must be centralized and command 

must be exercised through the air force commander.” When Kuter arrived in mid-May, he 

expressed surprise with the G-3 and OPD acceptance of coequality for air forces in the field. 44 

The sentiment for change was strong, but some of the machinations over the issue exposed 

embedded differences that would not die with the simple issuance of a new field manual. The 

Operations and Training Division of the General Staff, headed by an airman, led the way. Some

of the Army staff apparently accepted the notion that, because of endemic differences between

the AAF and AGF, the need was great for a new doctrine. The failure to agree on revision of FM 

31-35 illustrated the problem. The airmen wanted the Montgomery procedures; many ground

leaders wanted to relegate the air commander to the status of advisor or clear subordinate and to 

decentralize the control of air units to many ground units. 45 

G-3 had a distinctly different perspective about the need to rewrite doctrine, agreeing that 

the Montgomery doctrine was correct and had, indeed, been proved in combat. In a 29 April 

1943 memo, Maj Gen John Edwin Hull, acting chief of OPD and warmly regarded by the 

airmen, suggested that the Army had already condoned Montgomery’s principles in a number of 

82 
field service regulations and field manuals. He illustrated his point by citing portions of FM 100-

15, Field Service Regulations, Larger Units; FM 100-5, Field Service Regulations, Operations; 

and the basic air support manual, FM 31-35. Rather than form a new manual, he suggested a 

need for air and ground leaders to get together and work at refining FM 31-35. 46 

With his sense of open compromise, Hull then took exception to the attempt of the Air Staff 

to bypass the AGF in coordinating the new doctrine, although he remained a strong advocate of 

the need to refine tactical doctrine. One of Hull’s subordinates, Col Samuel E. Anderson, deputy 

chief (air), strategy and policy group, argued against asking the AGF for concurrence in a revised

doctrine. He felt it negated the very idea of coequality. While the air forces are vitally concerned 

with the success of the ground forces, the “Air Forces very properly do not try to influence 

ground force doctrine, tactics and techniques, nor do the Air Forces want to command the 

Ground Forces or control them in any other way.” Anderson also suggested that there existed “a 

strong group of officers at Army Ground Force Headquarters who do want to control and 

command at least a part of the Army Air Forces.” He believed the issue to be an air force matter,

and worked by air officers, but he had the political sense to ask that the OPD serve as the office 

of origination so the chief of staff will not be “looking for an ulterior motive; which he might 

look for if the paper originated in the Air Force.” 47 

This attempt to keep the AGF out of the loop was not as self-centered as it might appear. 

Throughout the war, the Army Air Forces operated integrally with War Department military 

planning activities, whereas the AGF staff at the National War College operated like a field

command, giving detailed instructions to ground commanders in combat. Hull understood that 

the issue would raise objections from the AGF staff; he also understood McNair’s argument. He

believed that McNair had a paramount interest in air-ground support and should have equal input 

into the issue. Hull supported McNair, a man with great “knowledge of tactics in grand strategy,” 

and agreed that McNair should be involved in the issue. Hull suggested finally that it was 

doubtful there would be unanimity in Washington, but “it is our responsibility here in the War 

Department, and particularly in OPD, to arrive at a solution which appears best to us after full 

consideration of every angle.”48 

A week later, Lt Gen Ben Lear, sitting in for McNair, wrote a scathing memo objecting to a 

radical revision of air support doctrine. He expressed fear that the ground forces would be even 

more ignored if the air forces were given too much’ independence, especially if they claimed a 

top priority for air superiority missions. 49 Ultimately, Hull did not allow his division to accept 

responsibility for writing air doctrinal revisions; the doctrinal writing went forward with a clear 

air force bias. G-3, Organization and Training Division, accepted the task to produce a new 

document. Having a small staff after the March 1942 reorganization, which saw the move of 

much of its personnel to the OPD, and wishing to avoid some of the Washington bickering, G-3 

Porter, an Army officer with combat experience in North Africa, passed the bail to those at 

Orlando. Apparently, G-3 could give orders directly to an Army Air Forces school. 

83 
Brig Gen Samuel E. Anderson 

When a colonel, General Anderson took credit for the use of bold, 

capitol-letter print in FM 100-20. (Source: National Air and Space 

Museum) 

84 
Lt Gen Joseph T. McNarney 

As deputy to General Marshall, and as acting chief of staff, US Army, 

General McNarney helped get FM 100-20 through the Pentagon. 

(Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

Porter commissioned the assistant commandant of the Air Support Department at AAFSAT 

“to set forth in a single War Department publication the accepted doctrine concerning the 

command and employment of air power” as learned from the Tunisian campaign. Apparently, 

AAFSAT was susceptible to getting orders from different quarters, and, with one important 

exception, this task from Porter matched the Kuter instructions sent a month earlier via Fairchild. 

50 Even in his end of tour interview on 22 May, Kuter did not express the need for a priority 

system, except in one instance where he claimed that Coningham had a two-phase procedure: 

“First, the requirement that he reduce the enemy air to practical impotence and after that to throw

the full weight of his air force against the enemy army.” 51 

Familiar with the new, important coequality issue and having very clear instructions, 

Colonel McKinnon quickly wrote a draft version of what was a very abbreviated manual, one 

that boldly affirmed a faith in tactical aviation rather than one that provided itemized 

instructions. As with all institutional products, individuals in Washington modified the final text. 

Several claimed to be authors, or at least critics, in its origination. (Colonel Anderson claimed 

responsibility for the bold printing.) On 28 May, Barney Giles, assistant chief of staff of the

Army Air Forces, directed Kuter to work on the new doctrinal manual. Three days later, Gen 

Joseph McNarney, an airman and acting chief of staff, ordered G-3 Porter to revise the training 

85 
literature to reflect new thinking about air support. McNarney’s letter described the major 

elements of FM 100-20 even before it was published. McNarney’s intention was to facilitate

training publications right away. 52 

Evidence of McNarney’s success in facilitating the new doctrine came in early June when it 

appeared in Army ground school manuals. For example, by June 1943, a month before the 

official publication date of FM 100-20, the Infantry School at Fort Benning, Georgia, ran a lead 

article on new air-ground doctrine in its monthly journal, The Mailing List. The editors even

went to the trouble of illustrating with pencil drawings the three phases of air support: air 

superiority, interdiction, and close air support. 53 

While the concept was disseminated to the organizations that formulated training manuals, 

Kuter prepared the proposed manual (already referred to as FM 100-20) and had forwarded it 

into the War Department bureaucracy by mid-June. On 19 June General Porter gave his full

approval and, acting as the facilitator in the General Staff, forwarded a copy to McNarney, 

currently acting as deputy chief of staff rather than as chief of staff in Marshall’s place, as he had

done two weeks earlier. 54 

In the package to McNarney, G-3 included supporting arguments and endorsements

affirming that the manual was “modem, brief, informative, and flexible.” G-3 offered that it was

carefully reviewed by a ground and an air general officer with combat experience in Africa and 

that it had been studied by General Porter (Infantry), Col Henry J. Matchett (Infantry), Colonel 

Argo (Field Artillery), Colonel Chamberlain (Coast Artillery, Antiaircraft), and General 

Stratemeyer, Maj Gen Barney M. Giles. Brig Gen John E. Saunders, and General Kuter (Air). 

Finally, it had the “enthusiastic approval of the director of Air Force instruction at the Command 

& General Staff School.” 55 

If Colonel Anderson is correct, Marshall tried to avoid dealing with the issue, but he was

persuaded to take a copy of the document home one night. The next day, he grudgingly blessed 

it. On 24 June McNarney formally endorsed FM 100-20 for publication. After the key G-3 staff 

members had carefully assembled a press release, Porter signed a 30 June memorandum to the 

adjutant general to publish FM 100-20. 56 

Field Manual 100-20. 21 July 1943, Command and Employment of Air Power, superseded 

and replaced Field Manual 1-5, Army Air Forces Field Manual It was not written to replace FM 

31-35, which dealt with tactical air operations and organizations exclusively: FM 31-35 

remained in effect, except where contradicted by FM 100-20, and efforts to revise FM 31-35 

continued. Pressure to speed the draft of FM 100-20 through the military departments precluded 

giving detailed description of the tactical processes included in FM 31-35. FM 100-20 is 

distinguished by its spare language. Much of the material is ordinary and unworthy of special 

attention. 57 

Most of the first two pages are written in bold capital letters, intended to draw attention to 

the most important point: that the Army Air Forces are quite independent and that, along with 

their important strategic mission, they have a high-priority tactical mission that equates with and 

parallels the ground battle. The first paragraph imitated the Montgomery precept that “LAND 

POWER AND AIR POWER ARE CO-EQUAL AND INTERDEPENDENT FORCES;

NEITHER IS AN AUXILIARY OF THE OTHER.” The second paragraph identifies the main 

independent mission and briefly explains the importance of air superiority: “THE GAINING OF

AIR SUPERIORITY IS THE FIRST REQUIREMENT FOR THE SUCCESS OF ANY MAJOR 

LAND OPERATION.” The third paragraph states the importance of flexibility in air applications 

and the importance of highly centralized command: “THROUGH THE AIR FORCE

86 
COMMANDER IF THIS INHERENT FLEXIBILITY AND ABILITY TO DELIVER A 

DECISIVE BLOW ARE TO BE FULLY EXPLOITED.” The same paragraph continues with the 

caveat, still in all capital letters, that air forces may not be attached to subordinate ground forces 

unless “ISOLATED BY DISTANCE OR LACK OF COMMUNICATION.” This was the same 

restriction to full central air control, stipulated in FM 31-35 and other manuals, that sensitive air 

advocates objected to, suggesting that FM 100-20 was not as extreme as popularly supposed. 58 

The remaining 12 pages in this short manual describe rather mundane, ordinary facets of air 

forces missions, organization, and general operational practices. The McKinnon authorship and 

similarity with FM 1-5 are evident, suggesting further that the Washington manual writers 

wanted to soften the blow of the first two pages. For example, a section described as “military

aviation” lists five types of tactical functions, from bombardment to troop carrier work. The next 

section, “organization,” describes the traditional, long-accepted organizations: “flight, squadron,

group, wing, division, command, and air force.” 59 

The final chapter describes in greater detail the four major specialties of the early war Army

Air Forces. They include strategic air force, tactical air force, air defense command, and air 

service command. This chapter explains the reason for centralized air command and offers a

reason or explanation for certain prescribed air force practices. For example, it describes why it 

is necessary to win the air battle before undertaking the ground battle, one of the serious

conditions necessarily ignored in Northwest Africa. It explains how parceling out air resources 

eliminates the flexibility needed to make air warfare effective. But the section on tactical 

aviation also discusses what quickly became the focus for ground enmity, the division of tactical 

efforts into priorities. 60 

In relatively great detail, given the length of this manual. FM 100-20 describes the three 

phases of tactical operations with clear levels of priority. The first is “to gain the necessary 

degree of air superiority.” The second is “to prevent the movement of hostile troops and supplies 

into the theater of operations or within the theater,” The final priority is “to participate in a

combined effort of the air and ground forces, in the battle area, to gain objectives on the 

immediate front of the ground forces.” Although the authors use the qualifier, “necessary degree 

of superiority,” the manual does not offer a suggestion that at certain times, emergency 

notwithstanding, these priorities would not hold fast. It is fully apparent that Washington 

advocates accepted the hard and fast rule of priority, even without having a historical example 

from the British or their own combat experience. 61

87 
Lt James H. Doolittle 

Shown here as a lieutenant, Doolittle was insistent on keeping his units 

under centralized command when he served as commander, Twelfth 

Air Force, In North Africa. (Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

88 
Brig Gen Lauris Norstad 

General Norstad, Doolittle’s operations officer In North Africa, helped 

General Doolittle and General Vandenberg coordinate US air units 

during the buildup of US forces there. (Source: National Air and Space 

Museum) 

89 
Brig Gen Hoyt S. Vandenberg 

General Vandenberg, Doolittle’s deputy in the Twelfth Air Force, later 

served as chief of staff, US Air Force. (Source: National Air and Space

Museum) 

Getting FM 100-20 through Washington politics in the early summer of 1943 was 

considered quite a coup by the airmen. Kuter even made special arrangements to get the new 

message out to the public. He persuaded a Saturday Evening Post writer, Forrest Davis, to write 

a piece on Army Air Forces operations that would discuss the “coequal and coordinate” ideas in 

the upcoming FM 100-20. The Davis article, titled “How to Conquer the Continent” got late 

approval from General Arnold, who generally seems not to have been an active player in 

Pentagon transactions for the new manual. Remembering Eisenhower’s prohibition of top-level 

headquarters’ officers getting personal coverage in the press, Kuter was somewhat embarrassed

when the article featured him. 62 

The very procedure that got FM 100-20 through the War Department, as well as the content 

of the document itself, had an immediate and, more important, a long-term effect on relations 

between ground and air. While the representation of ardent air officers and agreeable ground 

representatives on the War Department General Staff pushed the publication into the light of day, 

officers in the Army Ground Force Headquarters, National War College, located just across the 

river from the Pentagon, were quite naturally upset by not being included in the official review 

of this new air doctrine which affected them so very much. Ground advocates would be expected 

to pass their opinions, some with displeasure, to commanders overseas. They would find a ready 

90 
audience; few commanders, all arguments notwithstanding, believed that all air support should 

be centralized. Washington proponents had a rougher job convincing combat commanders, both 

air and ground. In the following months, even Arnold got anxious about distribution of the

manual. Kuter claimed it was a miracle that the doctrine was published by the War Department. 

It was a miracle that represented the corning together of a number of factors, including

personalities and tenuous conditions that would not exist in Washington at other times, and 

which would definitely not transfer easily to combat theaters. 63 

Postscript 

In June, just as McNarney sent FM 100-20 to be published, Kuter wrote to his old boss, 

Coningham, apprising him of the revolution in Washington and preparing him for surprise when 

he saw the new air doctrine. Kuter couched his comments in the context of interservice rivalry in 

general and the air-ground primacy debate in particular. He visualized the creation of FM 100-20 

as a distinct victory over opponents to airpower: “More people were defeated in Tunisia than 

Germans and Italians.” He told Coningham that the document offered air commanders the means

to increase their influence with the ground leaders. Coningham would have been pleased that 

Americans affirmed centralized air command and coequality. At the very least, it meant 

increased influence with Montgomery and other British and American ground generals he had 

worked with. 64 

Parts of FM 100-20 would have truly surprised Coningham; one important component of the

document did not match his own doctrinal view. Even a brief examination of Coningham’s 

operational history would show that he did not define tactical operations concepts as a formal set 

of mission priorities. While he advocated the primacy of air superiority, he also thought 

important the other basic airpower principle of flexibility in combat operations. Coningham 

would see that the three-level priority system expressed in FM 100-20 did not equivocate, and 

his combat-experienced air commanders would blanch at that kind of structuring regulation. 

American air commanders in Africa would have also raised their eyebrows. 65 

Kuter knew that; he remarked in his June letter to Coningham that Spaatz would be 

“amazed” at the new doctrine and the way it was presented. While it is true Spaatz was an active

advocate for an independent bombing campaign in Europe, there is no evidence he championed 

FM 100-20 to Eisenhower or to North African theater headquarters. Indeed, Spaatz had a

reputation for cooperating with his military colleagues and operating with much independence 

because he had developed a sense of trust with his superiors. The air battle in Africa was tactical.

The point was to work with and help the Army. 

66 

FM 100-20 does address correlation between headquarters and the field. In a letter to Spaatz 

in late June, Arnold offered new mar insight into the upcoming new manual, but he mentioned 

only the part about coequality and coordination, principles already accorded to airmen in Africa.

Foreseeing some resistance, he told Spaatz that the new War Department doctrine was packaged 

as a field service regulation, theoretically binding on theater commanders, rather than as a field 

manual, which would serve but to guide. Evidence suggests that-whether a regulation or manual, 

binding or advisory-the theater did not ritualize or even openly observe FM 100-20 as a doctrinal 

document. As before, the strength of Army tradition in ground warfare elicited comments from 

commanders in the field against centralized air. 67 

Arnold and others in Washington were reacting to critiques from the field; in particular, a 

letter from Brig Gen Paul Robinett on 8 December 1942 had made a splash. In his letter,

91 
Robinett had complained bitterly about air support in central Tunisia. McNair told Marshall that

Robinett’s letter was “a vivid picture, and its lessons cannot be brushed aside.” 68 Washington 

did not seem to understand that Eisenhower’s headquarters knew conditions were primitive in

Tunisia and that Robinett was judged to be out of step. The pact made by Marshall and 

Eisenhower in the early stages of war preparation in Washington regarding air equality-the June 

1941 organization that produced the Army Air Forces in particular-and the fact that the RAF was

an independent force guaranteed that airmen would have a great degree of centralized command 

of air resources. Spaatz did not particularly need fan mail in the guise of FM 100-20 to 

strengthen his hand. 

Washington persisted. By mid-October 1943, the Washington air staff planners were not at 

all encouraged about feedback from the field. They asked War Department staff officers in G-3 

to distribute a new memo, suggesting that all commanders and staff officers of battalion-sized 

and larger units be trained, and that “a test...be provided as a means of determining this 

knowledge.” General Porter responded, suggesting rather that overseas air forces prepare proper

postcombat briefings to show the effect of the new concept for command of air. He commented

that the indoctrination of field and general officers in the principles of FM 100-20 would not 

correct deficient military observer reports. Another War Department advocate suggested that the 

indoctrination of these high-level officers did not matter because commanders of divisions and 

lower-level units exercised no influence over employment of air resources; that was 

accomplished by “the supreme commander through the Air Force Commander.” The airmen then

suggested that indoctrination occur in the United States, as it was obvious that the combat 

commanders were not going to bend to the new concepts. 69 

Evidence also suggests that the airmen overseas did not play up the message of FM 100-20, 

regardless of the fact that it was distributed to all units and that every field and general officer 

was required to study it. Perhaps it was confusing in its mixture of directives-to the highest field 

command (particularly with regard to the coequality factor) and to the operational level-and its 

establishment of three priorities for air support. The problem, most likely, did not emanate from 

Eisenhower. He was already at least a mild proponent of coequality, and, besides, he was 

sensitive to Marshall or anything Marshall signed. He was also amenable to ideas that appeared

to come from the British, with whom he was to operate throughout the war. 

On the other hand, lower operational levels were on a different doctrinal level that appeared 

in bold relief at the end of the Tunisian campaign. Particular attention was given to the XII Air 

Support Command’s final report. Brig Gen Paul L. Williams had pleased his immediate 

American air and ground superiors; he did not please, and was not happy with, Coningham and 

the new level of command represented by Coningham and the NATAF. His end-of-campaign 

report clearly reflected good feelings about American doctrine, which he generally employed. It 

was FM 31-35 of course, and when the report got back to Washington, Kuter asked that 

Williams’s report be censored before it was sent around Washington and the training

schools. Williams was rewarded for his good work with the XII Air Support Command by being 

replaced. Coningham approved Maj Gen Edwin J. House as the follow-on commander of the 

American tactical air contingent. 70 

Coningham’s comments about the changes in the United States and the efforts of Kuter and 

others to gain independence for the air forces illustrate how parochial concerns dominated

theater thinking. Coningham was convinced that the air organization used in Africa was being 

copied in England, and he was happy “to polish up the whole machine, ready for possible 

operations of the home forces in Western Europe next year.” While Coningham was convinced 

92 
that the American strategic forces would lead the Americans to independence, he suggested less 

concern with trying to get too much independence from tactical operations: “The Tactical Force 

is not so strong a lever because of its close association with the Army.” For his part, Eisenhower 

supported Coningham when he told Arnold that the theater would handle its own problems of 

command relations, not referring issues “to the War Department.” 71 

Other indicators suggest that the remarkable doctrine in FM 100-20, in terms of equality for 

ground and air forces and tactical air operational priorities, worked better in Washington (in 

principle) than it worked in the theater (in application). After all, Kuter, even with his operational 

experience in Africa, was pushing policy rather than reflecting field experience when he was 

back in Washington. Eisenhower’s staff officers were well versed in air equality, but they

certainly must have winced when they saw the scriptures on mission priorities. At the very least,

the purpose of the writings was to keep field generals like Mark Clark and George Patton, and

influential theater staff generals like Walter Bedell Smith, from getting overly egotistic in their

attitude toward airmen. 

Not surprisingly, Arnold complained a year later to the G-3 of the General Staff that the

message of FM 100-20 had not won over field commanders-they continued to write battlefield 

reports denigrating the concept of a central air command of tactical air resources. The original 

distribution of FM 100-20 to headquarters of all battalions and larger units of each branch of the 

Army was not eliciting the desired change. 

A careful examination of the combat theaters through the remaining months of the war 

shows little indication of the presence of FM 100-20, little concern about coequality at levels 

below the theater leadership, and very few examples of actual coequality in organizational 

arrangements. Air superiority was a great and certainly an initial concern; but habitually, theater 

leaders broke up and re-formed air units to match perceived air support needs at any particular 

time. Airmen did not have an opportunity to show the rest of the Army that following the 

principles of priority and coequality had an advantage in skinning the air-support cat. Flexibility

rather than priority characterized operational functions. Perhaps coequality and priorities were 

not intended to have a specific effect at lower levels. Perhaps it was just an attempt by top Army

leaders to address service rivalry and influence issues in an attempt to satisfy Washington 

planners with a formal doctrine attuned to theater operations. In fact, it was a doctrine that 

authorized directives from Washington and, in most cases, it achieved just the opposite effect. 

Each campaign had an air-ground flavor unique to its particular conditions. 

From the beginnings of airpower in the United States, discordance characterized the 

relationship between the air forces and other corps and services, especially when aviation grew 

in size and influence relative to, and often at the expense of, other Army combat branches during 

the interwar years. While the artillery, armor, and cavalry branches made bids for greater 

independence within the Army in World War II, only the Air Corps claimed a high degree of 

independence-as well as funding equal to that of the rest of the Army ground forces. 

Tough decisions remained about employment of the air forces. It took sensitive judgment to 

decide what portions of the air resources would be used for independent operations and what 

portions would be used in direct support of the battlefield. Air and land warfare differed so 

fundamentally that competing voices arose during the Tunisian campaign, and some of the 

ground views were clearly not in focus with the uniqueness of air warfare and the conventional 

wisdom of the War Department. Most leaders saw that airpower was more than just airplanes

serving as a useful auxiliary for the ground battle. 

93 
The work of Kuter and the score of staff officers in Washington and Orlando who produced 

FM 100-20 guaranteed that the airman’s voice would be heard, not only in the continuing 

campaigns of Europe but throughout the next 50 years. For better or worse, airmen have had 

greater influence in the control of their forces, even in air units dedicated to ground operations. 

Centralized control for flexible employment of air units was recognized before World War

II, but it took something dramatic-like Kasserine, articulation of the policy by the British after 

their successes, and promotion of the idea by Kuter-to get it formalized in a published doctrine.

However we view the process that effected this doctrinal change, we see the hand of Kuter, 

whose efforts underwrote a more efficient and effective air force-one that played a significant 

and invaluable role in the defeat of the German and Japanese armies. 

94 
Notes 

1

 Task Force Smith refers to the 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment, 24th Infantry 

Division, commanded by Lt Col Charles B. Smith, that faced and was defeated by an entire 

North Korean Division in the first action of an American force in Korea in July 1950. American 

commanders made the decision to send the Smith Battalion out to block the North Korean 

invasion near Osan without sufficient intelligence about the enemy force strength. 

2

 David N. Spires, Air Power For Patton’s Army: The XIX Tactical Air Command in the 

Second World War, forthcoming. 

3

 George F. Howe, United States Army in World War II: Mediterranean Theater of 

Operations: Northwest Africa: Seizing the Initiative in the West (Washington, D.C.: Office of the

Chief of Military History. Department of the Army, 1957), 1-15; Harry C. Butcher, My Three 

Years with Eisenhower: The Personal Diary of Captain Harry C. Butcher, USNR, Naval Aide to 

General Eisenhower, 1942 to 1945 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1946), 25-32; Dwight D. 

Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe (New York: Da Capo Press, 1947, 1977), 69-73. 

4

 Daniel R. Mortensen, “History of Tactical Aviation” (unpublished manuscript, 1994), 

chap. 5. 

5

 Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Cate, The Army Air Forces in World War II, vol. 2, 

Europe: Torch To Pointblank, August 1942 to December 1943 (1949; new imprint, Washington, 

D.C.: Office of Air force History, 1983), 78-85; Howe, 253-73. 

6

 Craven and Cate, 78-85; Howe, 253-73. 

7

 Craven and Cate, 78-85; Headquarters 12th Air Force, “Standard Operating Procedures” 

(Air Force Historical Research Agency [AFHRA], 18 October 1942), microfilm 650.03-2, frame

1276; see also other intelligence reports. This Twelfth Air Force Headquarters intelligence 

procedures document spells out the expected practice whereby all groups or air commands would 

operate under the direct control of Air Force Headquarters. Quoted portions of this paragraph are 

from the following outgoing messages: Eisenhower to CG CTF (Fredendall) and to CG CTF 

(Patton), 23 and 28 November 1942, AFHRA, microfilm reel A6205, frame 258. One copy of the 

23 November message has a handwritten side remark illuminating the truculent attitude behind

the message. See also Mortensen, chap 7. 

8

 In mid-November, Arthur Tedder came to Dwight D. Eisenhower for a unified 

Mediterranean air command to carry the blessing of the British Combined Chiefs of Staff that 

would bring together the American air commanders who served under him in the Western 

Desert. These commanders included Maj Gen Lewis H. Brereton, Brig Gen Patrick W. 

Timberlake, and Col Uzal G. Ent. Craven and Cate, 106. 

9

 See Mortensen, chap. 5, for the degree to which Eisenhower understood basic Army Air 

Forces air doctrine. 

10 J. Scott Norwood, “Thunderbolts and Eggshells: Composite Air Operations during Desert 

Storm and Implications for USAF Doctrine and Force Structure” (student thesis, Maxwell AFB, 

Ala.: School of Advanced Airpower Studies, June 1993), 12. 

11 Vincent Orange, Coningham: A Biography of Air Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham, KCB, 

KBE, DSO, MC, DFC, AFC (Washington, D.C.: Center for Air Force History, 1992), 79. 112. 

12 Carl A. Spaatz to Henry H. Arnold, letter, 7 March 1943, AFHRA, Spaatz Papers, 

microfilm 168.491, reel 34165, frame 968/1250. 

13 Howe, 363-458; Craven and Cate, 105-165. 

95 
Notes 

14 Howe, 485-500. 

15 Diary of Carl A. Spaatz, 17 February 1943, Spaatz Collection, Library of Congress 

(LOC), Washington, D.C. 

16 Orange. 77-94. 

17 Ibid., 79. 

18 Ibid., 77-110. 

19 Ibid. 

20 Mortensen, chap. 10; Laurence S. Kuter, “Growth of Air Power,” unpublished 

autobiographical manuscript, 1970s, author’s files. 

21 Laurence S. Kuter, “Lessons in Air Force Organization Learned from the North African 

War,” press statement, 22 May 1943, Pentagon, AFHRA. 614.505. 

22 Ibid. 

23 Craven and Cate, 132-206, especially 137; Brig Gen Laurence S. Kuter, deputy 

commander, Tactical Air Force (Tunisian campaign), interviewed by assistant chief of Air Staff, 

intelligence, 25 May 1943, AFHRA, 142.052. 

24 Kuter interview, 25 May 1943; Report, “NATAF Situation-on-Air-Plan in Tunisia,” 

including appendix C (Coningham’s official directive), AFHRA, 614.430-2, reel A6011, frame 

1314. 

25 Field Manual (FM) 1-5, Employment of Aviation of the Army, 18 January 1943. An 

excellent analysis of the debate between air and ground proponents in early 1943 is found in 

Richard G. Davis, Carl A Spaatz and the Air War in Europe (Washington, D.C.: Office of Air 

Force History, 1993), 210-20. 

26 Davis, 212-13; Brig Gen O. A. Anderson, assistant chief of Air Staff, operational plans, 

memorandum to Director of Air Support, subject: “Revision of FM 31-35,” 25 February 1943, 

including attached revisions, AFHRA, 145.96-65. 

27 Anderson memorandum. 

28 Ibid. 

29 Ibid. 

30 Col H. J. Matchett, acting assistant chief of staff, G-3, memorandum to assistant chief of

staff, operations division, subject: General Montgomery’s “Notes on High Command in War.”

24 April 1943. National Archives and Records Administration. Modem Military Branch, RG 

165, G-3 (370.6-384). 

31 Col W. H. Hardy, instructor of aviation, Command and General Staff School. Fort 

Leavenworth. Kans., letter and attached comments on FM 31-35, 19 February 1943, AFHRA. 

145.96-65, frame 1635; Col Morton H. McKinnon, commander Air Support Command, 

AAFSAT, memorandum to Board of Officers Concerned, subject: Board Proceedings, Air 

Support Board, AAFSAT, 2 March 1943; Col Ralph F. Stearley, Air Support Directorate. Air 

Staff, memorandum to Col McKinnon, commander, Air Support Command AAFSAT, subject: 

Air Support Command Chapter, 6 March 1943; History, Air Support Department, Army Air 

Forces School of Applied Tactics (hereafter ASD, AAFSAT), XXXX, vol. 1, 32-34. 

32 Carl A. Spaatz to Henry H. Arnold, letter, 19 February 1943, AFHRA, 168.49-1, frame 

965; B. L. Montgomery, 8th Army, “Some Notes on High Command in War,” 2d ed., January 

1943, AFHRA, 589.84-1, frame 1083. 

96 
Notes 

33 Spaatz to Arnold, letters. 19 February 1943 and 7 March 1943, frames 965 and 968: 

Montgomery: Robert Frank Futrell, Ideas, Concepts, Doctrine: A History of Basic Thinking in 

the United States Air Force, 1907-1964 (Maxwell AFB, Ala.: Air University Press. 1989), 56. 

34 Spaatz to Arnold, letter, 7 March 1943. 

35 Ibid.; Laurence S. Kuter, interview, 25 May 1943: Col Ralph F. Stearley to Maj Gen St. 

Clair Streett, commanding general, 3d Air Force, letter, 24 April 1943, AFHRA, 168.7045-147, 

frame 2293. 

36 Stearley, memorandum to Col McKinnon, 6 March 1943; History, ASD, AAFSAT, 32-34; 

Headquarters Army Air Forces (HQ AAF), The Air Force in Theaters of Operations: 

Organization and Function (Washington, D.C.: War Department, March 1943): Futrell, 68. 

37 History, ASD, AAFSAT, vol. 1, 32-36; HQ AAF, Air Force in Theaters of Operations, 

45-46. 

38 Lt Col P. M. Barr, Headquarters NATAF, memorandum to Maj Gen M. S. Fairchild, 

subject: Organization of American Air Forces. 28 March 1943; Kuter interview, 25 May 1943. It 

has generally been held that the coequality and priority facets originated from Coningham and 

the Western Desert Air Force. The RAF never used a priority scheme, even though they gave 

great weight to air superiority and would easily have agreed with the concept, even if it meant a

loss of flexibility if an air commander stuck tightly to the three-layer system (Mortensen, chap. 

8). An indication of practices in Africa can be discerned from a training memo that carried a 

detailed description of the air plan, US Fifth Army, training memo No. 33, 22 April 1943. This 

training memo did not include the three-priority schemata, although it did incorporate 

Montgomery’s RAF ideas. Kuter Papers, AFHRA, reel 34162, frame 902: see also Kuter, “End 

of Tour Report”; Laurence S. Kuter. “Organization of American Air Forces,” 12 May 1943, 

report to CG, Army Air Forces, through channels, both in AFHRA, 614.201-1. Kuter’s reports 

were written with the dateline NATAF HQ, 12 May 1943, although Kuter had been in the United

States for several weeks.

39 Diary of Laurence S. Kuter, 24 September 1942, AFHRA, reel 1592. 

40 Kuter manuscript, 172-80. 

41 History, ASD, AAFSAT, vol. 1,30-32. 

42 Ibid. 

43 Robert A Lovett, assistant secretary of war for air, memorandum to Chief of Staff, 

subject: General Montgomery’s notes on “High Command in War,” 18 April 1943, NARS, ARG 

165, OPD-384, box 1305. 

44 George C. Marshall, memorandum to assistant chief of staff, G-3, subject: Revision of 

Training Literature, 24 April 1943, AFHRA, 34163, frame 1074; acting assistant chief of staff, 

G-3, memorandum to assistant chief of staff, OPD, subject: General Montgomery’s notes on 

“High Command in War,” 24 April 1943; Brig Gen J. S. Hull, acting assistant chief of staff. 

OPD, memorandum to chief of staff, 29 April 1943; Lt Gen Jacob L. Devers, commander 

armored forces, to Lt Col Orin H. Moore, armored force liaison officer, Hg AAF, War 

Department, letter, 3 May 1943, all in NARS, RG 165. G-3 (370.6-384); see also Col S. E. 

Anderson, memorandum to Gen J. E. Hull, acting assistant chief of staff, OPD, subject: Revision 

of Training Literature. 8 May 1943, NARS, RG 165, OPD-384, box 1305; Kuter to Spaatz, letter, 

25 May 1943, AFHRA. Spaatz Papers, reel 34165, frame 1250. 

45 Acting assistant chief of staff, G-3, memorandum, 24 April 1943. 

97 
Notes 

46 Brig Gen J. S. Hull, memorandum, 29 April 1943. 

47 Col Samuel Egbert Anderson, memorandum to General Hull, acting assistant chief of 

staff, OPD, subject: Revision of Training Literature, 8 May 1943, NARS, RG 165, OPD-384, 

box 1305; Gen Samuel E. Anderson, interviewed by Hugh N. Ahmann, 28-30 June 1976, 

AFHRA. K239.0512-905, 111, 116. 

48 Brig Gen J. E. Hull, acting assistant chief of staff, OPD, memorandum to Col Samuel E. 

Anderson, 8 May 1943, NARS. RG 165, OPD-384, box 1305: James E. Hewes Jr., From Root to 

McNamara: Army Organization and Administration, 1900-1963 (Washington, D.C.: Center of 

Military History, 1975), 66-67. 

49 Lt Gen Ben Lear, commander, AGF, memorandum to chief of staff, subject: General 

Montgomery’s notes on “High Command in War,” 17 May 1943, NARS. RG 165, OPD-384, 

box 1305. 

50 Brig Gen Roy E. Porter, assistant chief of staff, organization and training division, G-3, 

War Department General Staff, through CG, AAF, memorandum to Colonel McKinnon, 26 Aug 

1943, subject: Commendation, Source, in history, ASD, AAFSAT, vol. 1, Text, 36; see also 

History, ASD, AAFSAT, 36-42,494-500. 

51 Statement of Laurence S. Kuter, in Pentagon Press Conference, 22 May 1943, AFHRA, 

614.505. It is interesting that a few days after the 22 May interview in Washington, Kuter gave 

two more interviews at Orlando. He must have talked to McKinnon or seen a draft of 

McKinnon’s work because for the first time he mentions a three-phase system of tactical 

aviation. He claims that Coningham’s Unit, the NATAF, had a directive in the beginning and 

throughout the campaign listing three phases: first, the defeat of the German air force: second, 

the isolation of the German Army: and third, the redirection of all striking efforts against the 

German army in direct support of the ground push forward. Extant materials in our possession do 

not support this allegation about NATAF directives, nor do they match Coningham’s practices in 

the Western Desert. This remarkable interview document also becomes the initiator of the myth 

about misemployed air resources in North Africa before Coningham (with Kuter as his deputy) 

came along to de-emphasize local control and the misuse of bombers, and to end defensive

umbrella fighter support. Kuter interview, 25 May 1943; Brig Gen L. S. Kuter, interviewed by 

Cols Howard Engler and F. F. Everest, AAFSAT Air Room staff, Orlando, Fla., 15 June 1943, 

AFHRA, 248.531-6. 

52 General Giles, memorandum to General Kuter, subject: New Air-Ground Support 

Doctrine, 28 May 1943, Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Arnold Papers, box 42, Air 

Support of Armored Forces: Gen Joseph McNarney, acting chief of staff, memorandum to Gen 

Roy E. Porter, assistant chief of staff. G-3, subject: Revision of Training Literature, 31 May 

1943, NARS, RG 165, G-3 (370.6-384): Anderson interview, 28-30 June 1976, 111-12. 

53 Infantry School, “Air Ground Training,” Mailing List, July 1943, 1-38. 

54 Roy E. Porter, assistant chief of staff, G-3, memorandum to Joseph McNarney, subject: 

Revision of Training Literature, 19 June 1943, including endorsement, 24 June 1943: Porter, 

memorandum to the adjutant general, subject: Publication of FM 100-20, Command and

Employment of Air Power, 30 June 1943, in NARS, RG 165, G-3 (370.6-384). 

55 Col J. B. Burwell, G-3, memorandum to Col O. L. Nelson, assistant to the deputy chief of 

staff, 24 June 1943, NARS. RG 165, G-3 (370.6-384), box 122. 

98 
Notes 

56 Porter memo, 19 June 1943 and 24 June 1943 endorsement: Porter memo, 30 June 1943: 

Samuel E. Anderson, oral history interview, 28-30 June 1976, 114-15. 

57 Brig Gen Roy E. Porter, assistant chief of staff, organization and training division G-3, 

War Department General staff, to Col McKinnon, letter, 26 August 1943. The Marshall letter of 

April 24 had a clear flavor suggestive of Kuter and Coningham. On the other hand, Marshall was

watchful of the air war, had received letters of air importance from Eisenhower and other field 

commanders, and had been at Casablanca and received firsthand the British concepts for 

effective air support. At the very least he must have been sold on the ideas expressed in his own 

letter ahead of time. They were bold if also evolutionary in terms of the thinking that went into

the March 1942 reorganization which had already given airmen great independence. 

58 FM 100-20, Command and Employment of Air Power, 21 July 1943. For years Gen 

Haywood S. Hansell lectured at tile National War College deprecating that part of the original 

FM 31-35 that permitted subordination of air resources in extraordinary situations. General

Hansell, interviewed by author, mid-1980s, author’s files. 

59 FM 100-20, 2-5. 

60 Ibid.. 6-14. 

61 Ibid., 9-18. 

62 Henry H. Arnold, memorandum to Laurence S. Kuter, subject: Air-Ground Technique 

Employed in North Africa, 9 June 1943; Kuter, memorandum to Arnold, subject: Air-Ground 

Technique Employed in North Africa, 10 June 1943; Laurence S. Kuter, memorandum to 

adjutant general, subject: Air-Ground Technique Employed in North Africa, 16 June 1943; all 

are in AFHRA. Kuter Collection, reel 1468, frame 999; Maj Gen Laurence S. Kuter to Col Glen 

W. Martin, letter, 22 November 1950, AFHSO/AFHO. (Richard Davis found this document in a

Pentagon trash can.) 

63 Maj Gen Roy E. Porter, assistant chief of staff. G-3, memorandum to Henry H. Arnold, 

subject: Indoctrination, 19 September 1944, NARS, RG 407, AG (300.7). 

64 Laurence S. Kuter to Coningham, letter, 26 June 1943, AFHRA, Kuter Papers, microfilm

reel 34163, frame 1077. 

65 Ibid. 

66 Ibid.; Davis, Spaatz, 140-54. 

67 Kuter letter, 26 June 1943; Henry H. Arnold to Carl A. Spaatz, letter, 28 June 1943,. 

AFHRA, Kuter Collection, reel 1468. 

68 Lt Gen L. J. McNair, commanding general, Army Ground Forces, memorandum to Gen 

George C. Marshall, 30 December 1942, LOC, Arnold Papers, box 42. A copy went to Arnold, 

but Marshall also sent Arnold a copy. 

69 Porter memorandum, 19 September 1944. 

70 Laurence S. Kuter to assistant chief of air staff, intelligence, letter, subject: Remarks of

Brig Gen Paul L. Williams, commanding XII Air Support Command, 1 July 1943, and 

attachments. AFHRA, Kuter Collection, reel 1468; Arthur Coningham to Laurence S. Kuter, 

letter, 22 July 1943, PRO AIR (London: British Archives), 23/7439. 

71 Coningham to Kuter, letter, 22 July 1943; Eisenhower to Arnold, letter, 8 February 1943, 

AFHRA, Reel A1468, frame ca 1299. 

99 
Patton and Weyland 

A Model for Air-Ground Cooperation 

David Spires 

By the summer of 1944, Allied forces had four fighter-bomber tactical air commands 

supporting designated field armies in Europe; in the fall, they added a fifth. Of these, the team of 

Third Army, commanded by Lt Gen George S. Patton, and XIX Tactical Air Command (TAC), 

led by Brig Gen Otto P. Weyland, deserves special attention as the most spectacular Allied airground team of the Second World War. The Patton-Weyland relationship arguably proved the

most satisfying of all such partnerships between air and ground commanders during the conflict. 

It remains today a model for air-ground cooperation. 

By the time Patton and Weyland arrived in England in early 1944 to prepare for the invasion 

of the continent, tactical air doctrine had evolved substantially from the trial-and-error

experience of North Africa. Allied air-ground teams in the northwest European operation could 

rely on two doctrinal manuals: FM 31-35, Aviation in Support of Ground Forces (9 April 1942), 

which prescribed precise organization and detailed procedures for specific combat situations, and

the more philosophical and controversial FM 100-20, Command and Employment of Air Power 

(21 July 1943), which declared air and ground elements coequal, prescribed centralized control 

of air forces commanded by an air force commander, and established mission priorities of air 

superiority, interdiction, and close air support, in that order. 1

 

For Washington, D.C., headquarters service leaders and staff officers concerned with 

political priorities and advocacy roles, formal doctrine served as a prescript for right conduct in 

air-ground relations; deviations could hardly be accepted. In the field, reality tempered formal

doctrine, and cooperation tended to override interservice rivalry. Doctrine always proved more 

flexible when interpreted by the field commanders who had to adapt doctrine to reality if they

were to defeat the common enemy. The problems and frustrations encountered in North Africa 

led to important improvements in command, control, and operations. By the time of the 

Normandy buildup in early 1944, many of the participants involved had lived through North 

Africa and Sicily. They had tested doctrine under combat conditions, worked out problems, and 

created bonds that they brought to the northwest European campaign. 2

 

The Patton-Weyland partnership benefited from this experience. Reflecting on his pairing

with Patton, Weyland later recalled that he had no idea why he was selected and admitted that 

“nobody was really envious of me, let’s put it that way.” 3

 Although Weyland soon overcame his 

apprehension, his doubts are understandable given his and Patton’s differences in personality and 

background. 

Seventeen years Weyland’s senior, Patton arrived in England as a seasoned combat veteran 

of World War I and campaigns in North Africa and Sicily. He had a well-deserved reputation for 

his understanding of armored warfare, aggressive leadership, and plain talk. 4

 The soft-spoken 

Weyland, on the other hand, was largely unknown outside Army Air Forces circles-and he 

arrived in England direct from the United States with no prior combat experience. 

Nevertheless, Weyland proved to be a good choice to team with Patton. Although he lacked 

combat experience, he had spent his entire career in tactical aviation and understood air-ground 

100
requirements better than most people in the AAF. He brought wide experience in prewar 

operational units, thorough knowledge of tactical air operations, and a willingness to cooperate 

with the Army on air-ground objectives. His more subdued personality complemented Patton’s 

flamboyancy. If Patton overdramatically referred to his association with Weyland and the XIX 

Tactical Air Command as “love at first sight,” the two commanders do seem to have gotten on 

well from the beginning. 5

 

Lt Gen George S. Patton and Brig Gen Otto P. Weyland 

The leaders of the air-ground team that relieved Allied forces at Bastogne discuss the 

campaign against Germany. (Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

Weyland believed that his air base orientation program in England initiated Patton into the

intricacies and capabilities of airpower and served to overcome Patton’s unhappy experience in 

North Africa with Air Marshal Coningham. 6

 In fact, Patton already possessed a solid

understanding and realistic appreciation of airpower, having learned to fly in the early 1920s at 

Mitchel Field on Long Island. He often flew during the interwar period and owned his own 

airplane, which he flew as senior umpire in the Louisiana maneuvers involving IV Corps in the 

summer of 1941. He had experimented with light planes in a variety of roles, and his 

experiments had contributed to the ground forces’ later adopting them for liaison work. His afteraction report on the Sicily campaign reveals a perceptive student of tactical aviation’s 

capabilities and limitations. In a larger sense, Patton understood that air support had become

increasingly critical for an Army that emphasized mobility over firepower. 7

Given Patton’s experience and forceful personality, one might have expected him to ride 

roughshod over his air commander, whom he outranked and whose command was to support the 

Third Army in the field. Weyland explained that during their joint training in England he and 

Patton had arrived at the basic understanding that he, Weyland, “had full control of the air. The 

decisions were mine as to how I would allocate the air effort.” 8

 The record bears him out. 

Patton Inspects a light aircraft 

This aircraft was used to direct fighter-bombers to ground targets in front of his Third Army. 

(Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

Patton clearly realized that he had in Weyland a commander who believed the ground forces 

deserved all the assistance his command could provide and would, if necessary, be willing to

overlook convention and the precepts of normal doctrine to provide it. Indeed, among Ninth Air 

Force tactical air commands, only the XIX TAC flew more close air support than interdiction 

sorties during the campaign. 9

 Patton relished the air support he received and did not interfere 

with Weyland’s command; he preferred the role of chief advocate for the XIX Tactical Air 

Command with the press corps and within Allied councils. 10 

The initial rapport, confidence, and understanding established in England matured during 

four subsequent campaigns. Weyland’s tactical air forces demonstrated the soundness of their

liberal interpretation of doctrine and organization as well as an ability to minimize the limitations 

of airpower. 

101
Entering the Battle 

After waiting in the wings during the fighting in Normandy, the Third Army-XIX TAC team 

officially entered the battle for France on 1 August. Immediately, Weyland faced a great 

challenge-how to support Third Army’s blitzkrieg drive across France to the German border. 

Although his command grew to nine fighter-bomber groups (six P-47 groups, two P-51 groups, 

one reconnaissance group) totaling 400 aircraft, nothing in his own experience or the doctrinal 

manuals prepared Weyland for the kind of pursuit that eventually found his forces supporting 

operations on several fronts from the Breton Peninsula to the Mosel River. The more rapidly 

Patton advanced, the more difficult it became for Weyland’s airfield engineers and his 

communications, maintenance, and supply elements to keep pace. Too often, Weyland found 

himself the proverbial “fireman,” scurrying back and forth, attempting to maintain control and 

ensure effective operations. 11 

Stinson L-5s and Piper L-4s 

These light aircraft are being prepared for shipment to France. (Source: National Air and

Space Museum) 

Weyland proved a fast learner. The pace of the advance compelled him and his staff to 

reassess formal tactical air doctrine. Like the army his command supported, he needed to 

decentralize operations and disperse his forces, far more than established doctrine suggested or 

the planners had expected. At one point, XIX TAC deployed four headquarters elements that 

controlled fighter groups based in three different areas and staging from several others. Mission 

priorities became reversed. Weyland declared that the “first priority was cover of the armored 

units” in the form of dedicated air patrols-the same policy found so objectionable in North Africa

because it prevented the concentration of airpower. 12 

Weyland always looked back on the battle for France as his command’s finest hour. 13 Yet, 

despite an extremely decentralized command and control and a generous interpretation of 

mission priorities, the conduct of mobile warfare on several fronts presented the XIX TAC a

challenge it could never completely master. Supporting a variety of operations over vast 

distances, it invariably found itself unable to concentrate its airpower on one particular front 

without bringing suffering to the others. Only in late September could Weyland concentrate his

full force on Third Army’s eastern front. By then, bad weather, limited night flying capability, 

the Third Army’s own supply shortages, and strengthened enemy defenses conspired to halt 

Third Army’s offensive. The XIX Tactical Air Command’s dilemma in September suggests that

tactical air forces continued to represent a limited resource. 14 

Over the course of the battle for France, the Third Army and XIX TAC developed the

teamwork, cooperation, experience, and esprit necessary to mold a first-class fighting team. This 

relationship would continue to develop throughout the remainder of the campaign. Then came

Lorraine. 

The postwar Army has studied the Lorraine campaign in detail, but the Air Force’s role has

largely been ignored in favor of the more exciting blitzkrieg in France and rescue operations in 

the Ardennes. 15 Here, despite the advantage of overwhelming air superiority, mobility, and 

flexibility to swiftly concentrate forces against targets, tactical airpower’s key advantages proved 

largely ineffective in static warfare characterized by stiff defenses, bad weather, and the tyranny 

of logistics. Although proximity to the front eliminated many problems present earlier in France, 

Weyland’s forces, which had been reduced from eight to four groups to reflect the priority of the 

102
northern Allied flank, proved unable to propel a correspondingly reduced Third Army through 

the Siegfried Line under conditions similar to those of World War I. 16 

Inexorably, the challenge of operating in Lorraine with reduced forces compelled closer 

joint planning between air and ground officers in order to maximize the use of their limited 

resources. Weyland revealed himself to be a resourceful and pragmatic commander who did not

allow doctrinal pronouncements to dictate his actions; he often stressed close air support actions 

at the expense of interdiction. In one of the central developments in air-ground cooperation, he 

became the key figure in planning air support that included medium and heavy bomber assaults 

for three joint operations undertaken by Third Army against German border defenses. 17 

On the eve of the final joint offensive in mid-December, Patton met the press with his air 

commander. In order to inform the public at home, they discussed the “method of air-ground 

tactical cooperation.” After Patton explained that “no operation is contemplated without General 

Weyland and his staff being present,” Weyland said one key reason for the successful joint effort 

was that Third Army staff people understood “not only the capabilities... of air but also the 

limitations....Third Army does not look upon the XIX Tactical Command as a cure-all.” He then 

turned to the heart of the relationship: “Our success is built on mutual respect and comradeship 

between the air and ground...You can talk to any of my boys about that...My boys like the way 

the Third Army fights. My kids feel that this is their Army.” 18 

In the Ardennes campaign, the third major operation for Third Army and the XIX Tactical 

Air Command, tactical airpower was challenged to react to a major threat without benefit of prior 

extensive joint planning between air and land force commanders. Assigned to the counterattack, 

Weyland showed that tactical airpower could rapidly concentrate to blunt, and then help repulse, 

a powerful enemy assault in spite of weather delays, a small night-fighter force, heavy enemy 

flak defenses, and the most serious “friendly fire” problem since Operation Cobra. At the same

time, Ninth Air Force units slowly isolated the Ardennes battlefield from the German supply 

base. 19 

Weyland directed tactical air operations in the southern half of the Bulge, reaffirming the 

flexibility of tactical airpower and demonstrating just how far doctrine, organization, procedures, 

and experience levels of airmen had developed since the North African campaign. With hardly a 

pause, airplanes flew north to cover Patton’s fire brigade and east to harry German supply lines 

while a resurrected mobile command echelon ensured close coordination with the Third Army. 

Meanwhile, Weyland marshaled his support elements to make the extraordinary effort 

necessitated by the urgency of the situation. 

With an expanded command of eight fighter-bomber groups, Weyland’s responsibilities and 

effectiveness increased. Three groups always provided close air support while three others 

concentrated on interdiction. That left two others to fly escort, counterair, and defensive patrol, 

and to strike the pinpoint targets that seemed to need attention on a regular basis. Tactical 

airpower continued to be a limited resource, challenging leaders to use it wisely. 

Teamwork and cooperation in the Ardennes ultimately overcame the worst of the “friendly 

fire” incidents, as they did most of the other problems. Weyland and/or his mobile command 

post chief regularly attended the Third Army’s morning briefings to ensure continued joint 

planning and operations. The recently established combined operations office at corps and 

division levels allowed smooth and effective coordination among reconnaissance and fighter 

aircraft, ground controllers, and artillery units. Characteristically, the first priority proved to be 

air cover for the ground forces. Patton never interfered with the basic air plan to support his 

forces in the Bulge and to participate in Ninth Air Force’s interdiction program. In the end, 

103
tactical airpower in the Bulge operation, even as a limited resource, proved capable of providing 

sufficient concentration of force for decisive intervention on the battlefield. 

Republic P-47 

The P-47 fighter-bomber was the weapon of choice for the tactical air units In Europe. It 

conducted ground attacks after its escort duties were completed. (Source: National Air and Space

Museum) 

A P-47 crew warms up 

The P-47s In the background taxi up for a bombing mission over German lines. (Source: 

National Air and Space Museum) 

Maj Gen Otto P. Weyland 

General Weyland has a fancy office in Luxembourg in 1945. (Source: National Air and 

Space Museum) 

The last offensive, which carried the Third Army-XIX TAC team through the Siegfried Line

and across Germany, combined elements from earlier breakout and pursuit operations with the

entrapment of German forces in the Eifel and Palatinate regions. As in earlier offensives, 

Weyland’s experienced forces could rely on overwhelming air superiority and devote the bulk of 

their flying effort to second- and third-priority missions: interdiction and close air support, 

respectively.

20 

Douglas A-20 Havocs These Havocs of the 410 Bomb Group supported Patton as well as 

other Allied ground commanders. (Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

Sitting in a P-47 

Weyland was promoted to major general in early 1945. (Source: National Air and Space 

Museum) 

Patton, Weyland, and others watch a fighter-bomber formation 

Patton, at left, acknowledged the superb air support rendered by the men and planes of 

Weyland’s XIX Tactical Air Command. (Source: National Air and Space Museum) 

During the final campaign, Weyland and his airmen continued to take liberties with formal

doctrine as conditions dictated. When the air-ground team faced more mobile conditions after the 

Rhine crossing in late March, his command developed new mean to decentralize control of 

armed reconnaissance and close air support missions in the field. These actions went far toward 

providing Third Army’s corps and divisions with their own rapid-response air arm. Weyland 

relied not only on mastery of the air, but also on the experience, trust, and confidence of the airground team, from the top echelon to the lower levels of command. 

Postscript 

In the highly charged postwar period, Army Air Forces leaders moved swiftly and 

purposefully in the direction of an independent air force. In the late 1940s, many Army officers 

worried that the new Air Force’s control of tactical airplanes and equipment, its doctrinal 

104
assertions, and its overwhelming strategic priorities in the emerging cold war meant that the 

Army faced the prospect of less rather than more tactical air support for ground operations.

Critics found fault with the air-ground relationship during the Second World War and often 

resorted to doctrinal statements to support their perceptions of air-ground disagreements and 

controversy. 21 

Generals Patton and Weyland 

These commanders, one ground and one air, had a good relationship. (Source: National Air 

and Space Museum) 

General Weyland exemplified the type of practical leader who came to dominate tactical air 

operations in the European theater. At no time during the campaign in Europe did he pander to 

any formal War Department document on tactical airpower doctrine in day-to-day operations. 

Using doctrine as a loose guide rather than an inflexible dogma, Weyland approached each

situation on its own terms. Only with the end of the war in sight and the spate of wartime 

analyses of airpower underway, and with air leaders beginning to plan for an independent air 

force, did Weyland feel compelled formally to validate doctrine. Even then, his theme remained 

air-ground cooperation and the importance of preserving it for the future. 22 

The very fact that the Allies achieved general air superiority—their number one air objective 

at the start of operations on the continent—meant that sufficient attention could be devoted to 

conducting air operations much as Weyland and his fellow planners had intended. Success 

allowed General Weyland to provide far more close support to General Patton’s forces than

doctrine or experience had envisioned, Control of the air also made the inherent limitations of 

tactical aviation more manageable because it freed the command from excessive concern about

the Luftwaffe threat. 

Examination of the Third Army-XIX TAC partnership suggests that the shibboleth of 

doctrine and the traditional concerns about Army-Air Force rivalry have obscured the reality of 

air-ground relationships and operations in the Second World War. To be sure, this is only one

tactical airpower experience, but we hope it represents just the first among many comparative 

studies of Allied tactical air commands to show that cooperation, not confrontation, characterized

the air-ground story. 

The success of tactical airpower in the European campaign resulted from the timely 

convergence of four important developments: (1) the maturity of tactical aviation doctrine; (2) 

effective organization and procedures that stressed joint planning and operations at all levels; (3) 

a technical revolution that produced superb fighter-bomber aircraft and the communications 

required for successful command and control; and (4) above all, pragmatic, can-do people to

make the system work properly. 

The lesson is, clearly, that air superiority is only the first step. It ensures neither centralized 

control of air assets by airmen nor proper interdiction and close-air support programs. Although 

doctrine may very well be correct in principle, no air-ground program can succeed without 

efficient resources and the cooperation of air commanders and ground commanders. Generals

Weyland and Patton knew this. 

Writing to Weyland after the war, Patton said, “I told General Eisenhower during the 

campaign that I would be perfectly happy to have you as a Corps Commander at any time,” 23

Patton did not see his tactical air commander in a different uniform, Can one imagine an Army

commander today seriously considering an Air Force two-star for command of a corps? 

105
106

Notes 

The Patton-Weyland partnership, which was founded on mutual trust and respect, and on 

common interest, is the basic lesson from the Second World War for tactical airpower; it remains 

worth studying. 

1

 Field Manual (FM) 31-35, Aviation in Support of Ground Forces, 9 April 1942; FM 100-

20, Command and Employment of Air Power, 21 July 1943. 

2

 Significantly, the most important study used to prepare for air-ground operations on the 

continent came directly from North Africa rather from Headquarters AAF in Washington. Col 

Philip Cole et al., VIII Air Support Command, “Observers Report: Air Operations in Support of 

Ground Forces in North West Africa (15 March-April 1943),” report to Headquarters Eighth Air 

Force, 1 July 1943, Air Force Historical Research Agency (AFHRA), 650.03-2. 

3

 Gen O. P. Weyland, interviewed by Dr. James C. Hasdorf, 19 November 1974, AFHRA, 

K239.0512-813, 140. 

4

 On Patton’s career, see Claude S. Erbsen, “Old Blood and Guts,” Weekly Philatelic 

Gossip, 21 November 1953, 366-68; “Biographical Notes on General George S. Patton, Jr.,” 

Patton Collection, box 5, chronological me, Military Documents [MD], Library of Congress 

[LOC], Washington D.C.; Martin Blumenson, Patton: The Man Behind the Legend. 1885-1945 

(New York: Morrow, 1985); and Martin Blumenson, ed., The Patton Papers (Boston: Houghton 

Mifflin, 1974). 

5

 The quote is from George S. Patton Jr., War As I Knew It (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 

1947). 99. On Weyland’s career, see Weyland interview, 19 November 1974; Ninth Air Force, 

“Biographies,” Maxwell AFB, Ala., AFHRA, 1944, 533.293; and History, XIX Tactical Air 

Command, 4 December 1943-30 June 1944. 

6

 Weyland interview, 64-76. On the Patton-Coningham incident, see Diary of George S. 

Patton, entries 1-4 April 1943. Patton Collection, box 3, MD, LOC, Washington, D.C. The diary 

account in the collection includes the official messages. See also Blumenson, 203-8; Laurence S. 

Kuter, “Goddamnit Georgie: North Africa, 1943: The Birth of TAC Doctrine,” Air Force 

Magazine 56 (February 1973): 55. 

7

 Blumenson, 30; Report, Headquarters Seventh Army, “Notes on the Sicilian Campaign,” 

30 October 1943. 

8

 Weyland interview, 19 November 1974, 67,76. 

9

 Report, Air Effects Committee (12th Army Group), “Effect of Air Power on Military 

Operations, Western Europe,” 15 July 1945, chap. 3. According to this analysis, prepared under 

the direction of Gen Omar Bradley, XIX TAC devoted 42 percent of its sorties to close air 

support and 40 percent to interdiction. The figures for IX TAC are 27 percent and 46 percent, 

and for XXIX TAC they are 33 percent and 47 percent, respectively. 

10 Gen James Ferguson, interview, 14 June 1988, on file at Air University television studio, 

Maxwell AFB, Ala. 

11 On XIX TAC operations in France, see Otto P. Weyland, “Diary, 29 Jul 44-18 May 45,” 

AFHRA, 168.7104-1; Third US Army, “After Action Report,” August Operations, September 

Operations, 1944; XIX TAC, “12,000 Fighter-Bomber Sorties”; History, XIX TAC, 1 July 1944-

28 February 1945, pt. 2; XIX TAC, “A Report on the Combat Operations of the XIX Tactical Air 

Command,” 30 May 1945, AFHRA, 537.02; XIX TAC, “Morning Summaries,” 8 AugustSeptember 1944, AFHRC, 537.306A 

12 XIX TAC, “Report on Combat Operations,” 53. 
107

Notes 

13 Ferguson interview, 14 June 1988. The command celebrated its exploits in France through 

publications like XIX TAC, “12,000 Fighter-Bomber Sorties”; Air-Ground Teamwork on the 

Western Front: The Role of the XIX Tactical Air Command during August 1944, Wings at War 

Series, no. 5 (Washington, D.C.: Headquarters AAF, August 1944; Center for Air Force History, 

1992); XIX TAC “Planes Over Patton: XIX Tactical Air Command’s Support of Third in Its 

Swift End-Run Through France,” 30 September 1944, AFHRA, 168.7104-86, 30 September 

1944; and Impact U. S. Tactical Airpower 3, no. 5 (May 1945): AFHRA, 168.7104-92, May 

1945. 

14 See note 11. 

15 On the Army’s Lorraine Campaign studies, see Col Donald P. Shaw, to Lt Gen DeWitt C. 

Smith Jr., USA, Retired, letter, subject: Study of the Lorraine Campaign, 11 February 1982; Dr. 

Christopher R Gabel, “The Lorraine Campaign: An Overview, September-December 1944” 

(thesis, Fort Leavenworth, Kans., 1985). On the Air Force issue, for example, the official 

account of air action finds tactical operations well overshadowed by the strategic bombing 

campaign and special operations. See Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Cate, eds., The Army 

Air Forces in World War II, vol 3., Europe: Argument to V-E Day, January 1944-May 1945 

(1951; new imprint, Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History, 1983), 595-635. 

16 See Third US Army, “After Action Report,” September, October, November, December 

Operations; XIX TAC. “Morning Summaries,” 25 September-16 December 1944; Ninth Air 

Force, “Summary of Operations,” 25 September-16 December 1944, AFHRA, 533,3082; XIX 

TAC, “Daily Intelligence Summaries,” 25 September-16 December 1944, AFHRA, 537.606; 

History, XIX TAC, 1 July 1944-28 February 1945. 

17 Weyland “Diary,” September-December 1944. 

18 General Patton, General Weyland, and Third Army Correspondents, Conference, 9 

December 1944, AFHRC, 168.7104-101. 

19 See Weyland “Diary,” December 1944-February 1945; Third US Army, “After Action 

Report,” vol. 1, December, January Operations; XIX TAC, “Morning Summaries,” 16 December 

1944-31 January 1945; Ninth AF, “Summary of Operations,” 16 December 1944-31 January 

1945; XIX TAC, “Daily Intelligence Summaries,” 16 December 1944-31 January 1945; History. 

XIX TAC, 1 July 1944-28 February 1945, vol. 2, December 1944, January 1945 Operations; 

History, XIX TAC, 1 July 1944-28 February 1945, appendix, “Statistical Summary.” 

20 On the air campaign, see History, XIX TAC, February, March, April, May 1945; XIX 

TAC, “Morning Summaries,” 28 January-8 May 1945; XIX TAC, “Daily Intelligence 

Summaries (INTSUM),” 28 January-8 May 1945; 9th AF, “Summary of Operations,” 28 

January-8 May 1945. 

21 On the relations between Army Ground Forces and Army Air Forces headquarters and 

postwar tactical air power developments, see Caroline F. Ziemke, “In the Shadow of the Giant: 

USAF Tactical Air Command in the Era of Strategic Bombing, 1945-1955” (PhD diss., Ohio 

State University, 1989), 1-75. 

22 XIX TAC, “Report on Combat Operations,” Introduction. 

23 George S. Patton Jr., to O. P. Weyland, letter, 21 September 1945, Patton Collection, 

Personal and Professional Correspondence, box 3, MD. 
108 
109 
110 
111 
112 
113 
114 
115 
116 
117 
118 
119 
120 
121 
122 
123 
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Hayr, Air Marshal Sir Kenneth. “Logistics in the Gulf War.” RUSI Journal 136 (1991): 14, 19. 

Hamilton, Nigel, and Richard Lamb. “Book Reviews.” Sunday Times, London, 30 October 

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Holley, I. B., Jr. “Land/Air Operations in North West Africa.” RAF Historical Journal 9, 49, 52. 

Huston, James. Tactical Use of Air Power in World War II: The Army Experience.” Military 

Affairs 14, no. 4 (Winter 1950): 166-200. 

Infantry School, “Air Ground Training,” Mailing List, July 1943, 1-38. 

Kuter, Laurence S. “Goddamit Georgie: North Africa, 1943: The Birth of TAC Doctrine.” Air 

Force Magazine 56 (February 1973): 55. 

Maycock, Thomas J. “Notes on the Development of AAF Tactical Air Doctrine.” Military

Affairs 14 (1950): 186-89. 

“RAF Narrative: The Middle East Campaigns.” London, Public Record Office. 

Ramsden, J. M. “Gulf Air War.” Aerospace 18, no. 3 (March 1991): 4. 

Spaatz, Gen Carl A. “Leaves from My Battle of Britain Diary.” Air Power Historian 4 (Spring 

1957): 66-77. 

Tedder, Lord Arthur William, “Air, Land and Sea Warfare.” RUSI Journal 91 (1946): 64. 

“Training and Simulation: Filling the Missing Link.” Jane’s Defence Weekly (13 April 1991): 

606-09. 

Unpublished Manuscripts 

Gabel, Dr, Christopher R. “The Lorraine Campaign: An Overview, September-December 1944.”

Thesis, Fort Leavenworth, Kans., 1985. 

Kuter, Laurence S. “Growth of Air Power.” In author files. 

Mortensen, Daniel R. “History of Tactical Aviation.” 1994. 

Norwood J. Scott. “Thunderbolts and Eggshells: Composite Air Operations during Desert Storm 

and Implications for USAF Doctrine and Force Structure.” Thesis, Maxwell AFB, Ala,: 

School of Advanced Airpower Studies. 1993. 

Owens, Maj Patrick. “The Evolution of FM 100-20, Command and Employment of Air Power

(21 July 1943): The Foundation of Modern Airpower Doctrine.” Master’s thesis, Fort 

Leavenworth, Kans., 1989. 

Purcell, Edward T. “African Airline: A Study of Pan American Airways’ Operations in Africa, 

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Ziemke, Caroline F. “In the Shadow of the Giant: USAF Tactical Air Command in the Era of 

Strategic Bombing, 1945-1955.” PhD diss., Ohio State University, 1989. 

Briefings, Histories, Lectures, and Reports 

Air Effects Committee, 12th Army Group. “Effect of Air Power on Military Operations. Western 

Europe.” Report, 15 July 1945. 

Army-Air Force Relations: The Close support Issue (U). RAND Report R-906-PR. Santa 

Monica. Calif.: RAND. 1971. 

Briefing. USAF Fighter Weapons School, Nellis AFB. Nev., 2 June 1992. 

Cole, Col Philip, et al. “Observers Report, Air Operations in Support of Ground Forces in North 

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Eighth Air Force, 1 July 1943. 

Gropman, Dr. Alan. “How Much Aerospace Force is Enough for the New World ‘Order’?” 

Speech. USAF Deputy Chief of Staff for Plans Conference, Washington, D.C., 16 March 

1993. 

Headquarters Twelfth Air Force. “Standard Operating Procedures.” Maxwell AFB, Ala: Air 

Force Historical Research Agency (AFHRA), 18 October 1942. 

Headquarters Seventh Army. “Notes on the Sicilian Campaign.” Report, 30 October 1943. 

History. Air Support Department, Army Air Forces School of Applied Tactics. 

______. USAF 33d Fighter Group, January 1941-5 April 1943. 

______. XIX Tactical Air Command, 4 December 1943-30 June 1944, 1 July 1944-28 February 

1945, and February 1945-May 1945. 

Kuter, Laurence S. “Lessons in Air Force Organization Learned from the North African War.” 

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______. “Organization of American Air Forces.” End of Tour Report. Army Air Forces, 12 May 

1943. 

Mitchell, William. “Tactical Application of Military Aeronautics.” Lecture. US Army General 

Staff College, 1921. 

“NATAF Situation-on-Air-Plan in Tunisia.” Report. Maxwell AFB, Ala., AFHRA files 614.430-

2, frame 1314. 

Ninth AF. “Summary of Operations.” 16 December 1944-31 January 1945 and 28 January-8

May 1945. 

Patrick, Maj Gen Mason. “Reorganization of Air Forces for National Defense.” Report to the

Adjutant General of the Army, 19 December 1924, Spaatz Papers, box 3. 

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Command, 10 April 1943. In James Parton Papers, Special Collections, USAF Academy 

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XIX Tactical Air Command (TAC). “12,000 Fighter-Bomber Sorties.” 

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Maxwell AFB, Ala., AFHRA. 

______. “Daily Intelligence Summaries.” 25 September-16 December 1944, 16 December 1944-

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______. “Morning Summaries.” 8 August-September 1944, 25 September-16 December 1944, 

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Papers, Diaries 

Kuter, Laurence S. Diary. 24 September 1942. Maxwell AFB, Ala., AFHRA file, 1592. 

______. Papers. Maxwell AFB, Ala., AFHRA. 

Patton Collection. “Biographical Notes on General George S. Patton Jr.” Manuscript Division, 

Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., box 5, chronological file. 

Patton, George S. Diary, 1-4 April 1943. Patton Collection, Manuscript Division, Library of 

Congress, Washington, D.C. 

Spaatz, Gen Carl A. Diary. Carl A. Spaatz Papers, box 7. Manuscript Division, Library of 

Congress, Washington, D.C. 

______. Papers. Boxes 10, 11, 23, and 136. Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, 

Washington, D.C. 

Smith, W. B. Papers. Personal Correspondence, box 10, Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas. 

Weyland, Gen Otto P. Diary, September-December 1944. AFHRA, Maxwell AFB, Ala. 

Interviews 

Anderson, Gen Samuel E. Interview with Hugh N. Ahmann, 28-30 June 1976. AFHRA files, 

K239.0512-905. 

Cochran, Philip G. Interview with assistant chief of Air Staff, Intelligence, 28 June 1943. 

Washington, D.C. Copy at AFHRA, Maxwell AFB, Ala. No. 142.034-2. 

Coningham, Air Marshal Sir Arthur. Interview with F. C. Pogue, 14 February 1947. The Office

of the Chief of Military History Collection, Archives, US Army Military History Institute,

Carlisle Barracks, Pa. 

Ferguson, Gen James. Interview, 14 June 1988. Air University television studio, Maxwell AFB, 

Ala. 

Kuter, Laurence S. Interview with Thomas A. Sturm and Hugh N. Ahmann, September-October 

1974. Bolling AFB, Washington, D.C. AFHRA file K239.0512-810. 

______. Interview with assistant chief of Air Staff, Intelligence, 25 May 1943. AFHRA files

142.052. 

______. Interview with Cols Howard Engler and F. F. Everest, AAFSAT Air Room, Orlando, 

Fla., 15 June 1943. 

Momyer, Gen William W. Interview with Lt Col John N. Dick Jr., 31 January 1977. Maxwell 

Air Force Base, Ala., AFHRA, K239.0512-1068. 

Spaatz, Gen Carl A. Oral History interview with Arthur Goldberg, 19 May 1965. AFHRA, 

K239.0512-755. 

Spaatz, Mrs. Carl A. Interviews with David R. Mets, 25 March 1982, 27 June 1982, and 12 April 

1984. Washington, D.C. 

Weyland, O. P. Interview with Dr. James C. Hasdorf, 19 November 1974. Maxwell AFB, Ala., 

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129
Memorandums 

Acting Chief of Staff, G-3. Memorandum. To assistant chief of staff, Operations Division. 

Subject: General Montgomery’s “Notes on High Command in War,” 24 April 1943. 

Anderson, Brig Gen O. A., assistant chief of Air Staff, operation plans. Memorandum. To 

director of air support. Subject: Revision of FM 31-35, 25 February 1943. 

Anderson, Col Samuel Egbert. Memorandum. To Gen J. E. Hull, acting assistant chief of staff, 

Operations Division. Subject: Revision of Training Literature, 8 May 1943. 

Arnold, Henry H. Memorandum. To Laurence S. Kuter. Subject: Air-Ground Technique 

Employed in North Africa, 9 June 1943. 

Barr, Lt Col P. M., Headquarters NATAF. Memorandum. To Maj Gen M. S. Fairchild. Subject: 

Organization of American Air Forces, 28 March 1943. 

Burwell, Col J. B., G-3. Memorandum. To Col O. L. Nelson, assistant to the deputy chief of 

staff. Subject (unknown), 24 June 1943. 

Giles, Gen Barney M. Memorandum. To Gen Laurence S. Kuter. Subject: New Air-Ground 

Support Doctrine, 28 May 1943. 

Hull, Brig Gen J. S., acting assistant chief of staff, OPD. Memorandum. To chief of staff, G-3.

Subject: General Montgomery’s “Notes on High Command in War,” 24 April 1943. 

______. Memorandum. To Col Samuel E. Anderson. 8 May 1943. 

Kuter, Laurence S. Memorandum. To Henry H. Arnold. Subject: Air-Ground Technique 

Employed in North Africa, 10 June 1943. 

______. Memorandum. To adjutant general. Subject: Air- Ground Technique Employed in North 

Africa, 16 June 1943. 

Lear, Lt Gen Ben, commander. Memorandum. To chief of staff. Subject: General Montgomery’s 

“Notes on High Command in War,” 17 May 1943. 

Lovett, Robert A., assistant secretary of war for air. Memorandum. To chief of staff. Subject: 

General Montgomery’s “Notes on High Command in War,” 18 April 1943. 

Marshall, George C. Memorandum. To assistant chief of staff, G-3. Subject: Revision of 

Training Literature, 24 April 1943. AFHRA files, 34163, frame 1074. 

Matchett, Col H. J., acting assistant chief of staff, G-3. Memorandum. To assistant chief of staff, 

Operations Division. Subject: General Montgomery’s “Notes on High Command in War,” 

24 April 1943. 

McKinnon, Col Morton H., commander Air Support Command, AAFSAT. Memorandum. To 

Board of Officers Concerned. Subject: Board Proceedings, Air Support Board, AAFSAT, 2 

March 1943. 

McNair, Lt Gen L. J., commanding general, Army Ground Forces. Memorandum. To Gen 

George C. Marshall, 30 December 1942. 

McNarney, Gen Joseph, acting chief of staff. Memorandum. To Gen Roy E. Porter, assistant 

chief of staff, G-3. Subject: Revision of Training Literature, 31 May 1943. 

Porter, Brig Gen Roy E., assistant chief of staff, Organization and Training Division, G-3. 

Memorandum. To Colonel McKinnon. Subject: Commendation, Source, in History of the

Air Support Department, Army Air Forces School of Applied Tactics, vol. 1, 26 August 

1943. 

130
______. Memorandum. To Joseph McNarney. Subject: Revision of Training Literature, 19 June

1943, to include indorsement of 24 June 1943. 

______. Memorandum. To adjutant general. Subject: Publication of FM 100-20, Command and 

Employment of Air Power, 30 June 1943. 

______. Memorandum. To Heruy H. Arnold. Subject: Indoctrination, 19 September 1944. 

Stearley, Col Ralph F., Air Support Directorate, Air Staff. Memorandum. To Col McKinnon, 

commander Air Support Command, AAFSAT. Subject: Air Support Command Chapter, 6 

March 1943. 

Correspondence 

Arnold, Henry H. Letter to Spaatz, 28 June 1943. AFHRA files, reel 1468. 

______. Letter to Lord Arthur William Tedder. 5 July 1943. In Arnold Papers, box 47, 

Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 

Brett, Maj Gen George H. Letter to Gen Henry H. Arnold, 22 September 1941. In Arnold Papers, 

box 41, Washington, D.C., Library of Congress. 

Devers, Lt Gen Jacob L., commander Armored Forces. To Lt Col Orin H. Moore, Armored 

Forces liaison officer, HQ Army Air Force, War Department. Letter, 3 May 1943. 

Eisenhower, Gen Dwight D. Letter to Gen Henry H. Arnold, 21 November 1942. PrePresidential Files, Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas, box 5. 

______. Letter to Gen Henry H. Arnold, 8 February 1943. AFHRA files, A1468, frame ca. 1299. 

Hart, Liddell. Letter to Cassell & Co., Ltd., 26 April 1966. Liddell Hart Centre for Military 

Archives, King’s College, London. 

Kuter, Laurence S. Letter to assistant chief of air staff, intelligence. 1 July 1943. AFHRA files, 

Kuter Collection, reel 1468. 

Kuter, Maj Gen Laurence S. Letter to Col Glen W. Martin, 22 November 1950. 

______. Letter to Spaatz, 25 May 1943. Spaatz papers, reel 34165, frame 1250. 

Patton, George S. Letter to Weyland, 21 September 1945. Patton Collection, Manuscript 

Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., Personal and Professional 

Correspondence, box 3. 

Porter, Brig Gen Roy E. Letter to Col McKinnon, 26 August 1943. 

Shaw, Col Donald P. Letter to Lt Gen DeWitt C. Smith Jr., USA, Retired, 11 February 1982. 

Spaatz, Maj Carl A. Letter to Maj T. D. Milling at Fitzsimmons Army Hospital, Denver, Colo.,

20 August 1930. Spaatz Papers, box 5. 

______. Letter to Gen Henry H. Arnold, 18 February 1943. Spaatz Papers, box 10. 

______. Letter to Gen Henry H. Arnold, 19 February 1943. 

______. Letter to Gen Henry H. Arnold, 7 March 1943. Spaatz Papers, box 11. 

______. Letter to Gen Henry H. Arnold, 24 May 1943. Spaatz Papers, box 11. 

Stearley, Col Ralph F. Letter to Maj Gen St. Clair Streett, 24 April 1943. AFHRA file, 168.7045-

147, frame 2293. 

131
132

Microfilm 

Adler, Brig Gen Elmer E., U.S. Military North African Mission, Cairo. To Brig Gen H. J. F. 

Miller, HQ Service Command, Wright Field, Dayton, Ohio, 29 November 1941. In 

Microfilm, A.1748, Bolling AFB, Washington, D.C. 

______. Press Conference, 25 March 1943. In Microfilm, A.1748, Bolling AFB, Washington, 

D.C. 

Olds, Brig Gen Robert, head of USAAC Ferrying Command in Washington, D.C. To Brig Gen 

Elmer E. Adler, US Military North African Mission, Cairo, 14 February 1942. In Microfilm, 

A.1748, Bolling AFB, Washington, D.C. 

Wildman, Maj Frederick S., and Lt Col C. V. Whitney. Interviews, in Microfilm, A.1274, 

Bolling AFB, Washington, D.C.