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This is Volume One of The Army Air Forces in World War II, titled Plans and Early Operations, January 1939 to August 1942, edited by Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Cate. The University of Chicago Press first published it in 1948, and the Office of Air Force History reprinted it in 1983. The front matter explains how the AAF historical program was set up during the war. The index covers Pacific, Atlantic and European operations, and nothing in the text concerns unidentified aerial phenomena.
“The Invaders”15 pages
T H E A R M Y A I R F O R C E S I N W O R L D W A R I 1 front. Because Hitler was convinced that the Russian campaign would be concluded within a very short time, he was opposed to the destruc- tion of Russian factories by bombing, and upon his insistence the Luftwaffe was used primarily as an extended form of artillery in sup- port of ground forces. A similar employment of the Soviet Air Force was made by the defenders, but the opposition by that force was stronger than the Germans had anticipated and was more impressive than the performance of Russian air units in the Spanish civil war. Soviet aviation, organized into a small naval air force and a larger army air force, had originated during the days prior to World W a r I and had been strongly influenced during the 1920’sby the germ an^.^' T h e Soviet government had given considerable attention to the stimu- lation of popular interest in aviation and to the development of an aircraft industry, but at the time of the German attack in June 1941 the Soviet Air Force was reported to be inferior to the German Air Force in standards of aircraft and personnel. Perhaps because of the nature of the fighting which developed in the summer of 1941,the Russians employed their air strength almost entirely as a tactical force in co-operation with ground forces. Production of fighters and short- range bombers received major emphasis. During the early weeks of the hostilities, the Soviet Air Force suffered tremendous losses in com- bat with the Luftwaffe. In addition, the rapid German advance dis- rupted the air supply and maintenance system and a large part of the Soviet aircraft industry. But the Russians displayed a remarkable ability to continue their defense under the most adverse circumstances. In late 1941 the IL-2, or Stormovik, was put into action along the front, where it proved to be outstanding in attacks against enemy ground forces. During the summer and fall of 1941 the Soviet Air Force was completely reorganized, some assistance began to arrive from other nations opposed to the Axis, and the regenerated air force, operating in close co-operation with the Red army, continued to hold up against all the aerial might which the Germans could throw into the battle. In its initial assault against Russia, the German army had been sup- ported by 3,300 aircraft out of a total strength of approximately 5,900 operational and nonoperational aircraft. In the drive toward Moscow in the autumn of 1941,the Luftwaffe deployed almost 60 per cent of its strength along the eastern front, and it suffered extremely heavy losses. Yet the Russian operations caused no immediate increase in 98
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