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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.
“Pacific Ocean”16 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 2 6,416; monthly replacements, 2,2 76. Current procurement schedules used in these estimates listed as on order or on approved programs 72,183 military aircraft, of which 43,320 were for the AAF, 9,457 for Army defense aid (mostly for Britain), and 8,395 for direct British contracts. T o attain its own goal of approximately 60,000 planes, the AAF proposed to add to current schedules a fill-in program of 16,437 aircraft." T h e huge forces recommended in AWPD/ I reflected the offensive mission contemplated for the AAF in the new strategic plans. And just as those plans were based on combined Anglo-American operations, so also must plans for the vast munitions program be based on the needs of the two powers and on their combined production potential. Ger- many's attack on the U.S.S.R. on 2 2 June gave England a most valu- able ally, but Soviet munitions requirements added to the problems of allocation. Preliminary negotiations with a Soviet military mission began in Washington in early August, and the U.S.S.R. was promised among other items forty P-40's and five B-~g's.''~In September a combined Anglo-American mission with full powers to formulate a long-term supply program departed for Moscow. The American dele- gates, en route, stopped over a t London and there, with the British War Cabinet and the U.S. special observers, investigated the possi- bilities of the proposed combined munitions program. The British had prepared, a t the instigation of President Roosevelt, an estimate of munitions requirements similar to that submitted by the Joint Board on I I September.'O' From the information thus provided, the President hoped to have formulated a Victory Program for the creation of a huge pool of weapons for the common service of nations opposing the Axis. Between 17 and 2 0 September, the British and American estimates were examined jointly. Aircraft requirements listed in AWPD/I were accepted tentatively, subject to deletion of ten medium bombardment and twelve pursuit groups for which desig- nated bases could not be provided. British requirements amounted to 49,385 planes, including first-line strength and wastage for the RAF and the Fleet Air Arm, but not trainers or strategic reserve. Of these, the British calculated they could build 35,832 by July 1943, leaving a deficit of 13,553 to be made up by the United States.'" It was decided in the London conference that the estimates of Soviet needs, when obtained, should be added to these figures and that the resulting totals, 1 3 2
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