“Nevers”44 pages
- p. 43 …cavalry mounted on gas driven flying horses” never arrived to
“sweep the Germans from the sky…
- p. 46 …Mitchell never received an American air force commensurate with
the ambitious idens of air power which…
- p. 49 …This project, like so many others, had lagged, and the Air Service was
never equipped during…
- p. 50 …the Army or the Air Corps?” but never, “Are
you in the Army or the Corps…
- p. 55 …any Air Service officers, and I have never heard
anybody yet-any Air Service officer-against…
- p. 69 …But one axiom,
with its corollaries, never varied. T o him the airplane was first and…
- p. 75 …Powerful air attacks resolutely pressed home could never be
completely stopped, but their effects could best…
- p. 94 …rate for the time being, the decision never-
theless left an open question as to how…
- p. 121 …large-scale warfare; production of combat types never exceeded 300
aircraft a month. The pattern of…
- p. 122 …the German Air Force, the
Regia Aeronautica never exhibited sufficient power to be decisive in
the…
- p. 133 …Except for a few raids against French
factories, the force had never been employed in a…
- p. 140 …into
a complete war economy production was never equal to the demands
of our own forces…
- p. 150 …Long-term needs
of the Air Corps and the sudden availability of funds in quantities
never…
- p. 181 …Actually, the Air Staff had
never approved of the method followed in RAINBOW No. 5 . l…
- p. 217 …Members of the Hawaiian Air Force, who had never flown
heavy bombers, began to receive intensive…
- p. 219 …were not then satisfactory for permanent garrisons. Never-
theless, the commander of the Hawaiian Department, Lt…
- p. 227 …T h e planes never reached their destination. Other
bombardment units were being prepared for transfer…
- p. 241 …responsible officers, a few crucial points
have never been satisfactorily explained.
T h e general pattern…
- p. 277 …motors, sole-
noids, and gun mounts-were never found. After many hours of fruit-
less search…
- p. 288 …planners and
from which AAF Headquarters was never to deviate.
The translation of the accepted grand…
- p. 303 …the principal features of the plan
were never challenged, it was subsequently revised in a draft…
- p. 309 …W a r Plans Division was
never incorporated into GHQ and remained a potential rival to…
- p. 336 …the shooting and wrote that they were never
able to make out an airplane.g6It is…
- p. 412 …As it happened, the B-24's never
returned to India, but, instead, remained in the…
- p. 457 …Meanwhile the Edsall with the remaining
pilots had headed for Java, never to be heard from…
- p. 492 …Squadron was assigned, but which it would never reach, going from
Australia to Tongatabu; ( 3 ) Christmas…
- p. 500 …deck of a carrier presented a problem never
before challenged by Army planes. Hence an accelerated…
- p. 502 …the bows and wetting the flight deck. Never before had this been
accomplished, yet now it…
- p. 509 …Island, in the
Louisiade Archipelago.” They were never needed, for on 7-8 May
the two…
- p. 513 …exist, it was at a point which never reached the
aircrews, for on the operational level…
- p. 524 …handicaps under which
AAF planes had operated. Never were more than fourteen B- I 7’s…
- p. 527 …AAF planners clung firmly to their belief that
proper observance of economy of force would never…
- p. 531 …Crews which had
previously never loaded torpedoes now for the first time fitted these
weapons into…
- p. 544 …But the Japanese never at
any time based their bombers in appreciable numbers a t either…
- p. 548 …26's in torpedo-dropping, but they never would be put into
All told, the record…
- p. 556 …until it had been thoroughly trained and never to com-
mit it piecemeal. General Magruder had…
- p. 560 …pressed into service against the Germans," and never reached the
CBI." Colonel Haynes had reached India…
- p. 606 …reason that the Antilles Air Task Force
never evolved, as did I Bomber Command, into an…
- p. 614 …that reason deserving a high
priority, could never dispose of the U-boat menace but must…
- p. 635 …In Washington the Munitions Assign-
ments Board t had never considered this schedule as more than…
- p. 670 …they bombed from 39,200 feet, and never
below 30,000. By AAF standards they had…
- p. 672 …Goering had never put enough bombers over England,
nor had he concentrated his forces on the…
- p. 690 …of co-operation and combined action probably never
before equaled by the military forces of two…
- p. 729 …shoot at aerial targets, and several
had never operated a turret in the air. This deficiency…
T H E A I R C O R P S P R E P A R E S F O R W A R , 1 9 3 9 - 4 ’
they showed on the whole a high degree of T h e most
important changes occurred after June I 940.
On the eve of the European war, most Americans seemed to be
confident of an ultimate victory for England and France; 8 4 and, if the
blitzkrieg in Poland raised doubts, the “phony war” of the winter
months allayed them.85T h e spectacular spring victories of the Nazis,
climaxed by the fall of France, hit the United States like a cold douche.
England’s chances of survival seemed at best no better than even, and
our own immunity from war seemed challenged.86 German soldiers
looking across the Straits of Dover were chanting “Today England,
tomorrow the whole world.” T h e song, if somewhat boastful, did not
sound like a lullaby in the United States. Our rearmament program
was gaining momentum but wanted time for full achievement. T o
many it appeared that we could complete that program without hos-
tile interruptions only if the United Kingdom should continue as a
belligerent with a fleet and an air force in being. So it was national
self-interest as well as sympathy that led an increasing proportion of
Americans to advocate measures in support of the British.87This view
was aptly summarized in the title of the citizens’ group which most
actively supported it-the Committee T o Defend America by Aiding
the Allies.
United States and British leaders declared, whether candidly or not,
that these measures need go no further than making available to Eng-
land the products of American industry and agriculture. Furnishing
munitions did remain the most effective means of aiding the allies,
though by autumn 1941“measures short of war” had carried us in the
Atlantic to orders “to shoot on sight.”88 T h e task of providing
weapons to England and other friendly powers, though undertaken in
order that we might have time to arm our own forces, greatly compli-
cated that process. Because of the limited capacity of a munitions
industry not yet at peak performance, there was inevitably a conflict
between the demands of the U.S. services and the allied nations, and
the apportionment of weapons to our greatest advantage required rare
judgment and tact and firmness. In the two years before Pearl Harbor
there were numerous changes in the machinery for allocation and in
the details of policy. But in respect to air materiel, the most important
item involved, the administration tended after Dunkirk to favor Eng-
land’s immediate combat needs over the requirements of Air Corps
expansion. In the course of 1941;as it became more apparent that we
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