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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
P E A R L H A R B O R A N D C L A R K F I E L D enemy pursuit pilots had so systematically chosen their targets that seventeen or eighteen of the bombers were de~troyed.~*Damage a t Iba was, if anything, even more severe. Of the 3d Squadron’s P-~o’s, apparently only two escaped destruction. Bombs crashed into barracks and service buildings. Much of the airplane maintenance equipment was lost, and with it the entire radar installation. Ground crews, who had thought the approaching planes friendly, suffered heavily. A bombing attack on Nichols Field in the early morning of 9 December created still more havoc. Bombs fell on a hangar, damaging several planes and destroying a t least one B- I 8. Several pursuit planes had been ordered off the ground for night patrol, but the inadequacy of night-flying facilities and almost impenetrable dust a t the field resulted in the loss of two or three of these planes and one pilot.5s In less than one day of hostilities the strength of the Far East Air Force had been reduced by half. Of its thirty-five B-17’s, not more than seventeen remained in commission. About fifty-five of the original P-40’s had been lost either in combat or on the ground. Of the P-3 5’s, no more than fifteen were operational, and perhaps twenty-five to thirty miscellaneous aircraft-B- ~o’s,B-I S’s, and observation planes- also had been destroyed. Casualties were comparably heavy. At Clark Field alone, 55 officers and men had been killed and more than IOO wounded, to which numbers were added approximately 25 killed and 5 0 wounded a t other points.54 The War Department had forwarded instructions to General Mac- Arthur to carry out the tasks assigned under RAINBOW No. 5 and to co-operate with the British and Dutch insofar as it was possible without jeopardizing the accomplishment of his primary mission of defending the phi lip pine^.^^ Bomber losses, however, left little hope of effective offensive action, and comparably heavy losses of pursuit air- craft lent a new desperateness to prospects for defense against an expected enemy invasion. In a move of adjustment to the losses sus- tained, the remaining aircraft of the hard-hit 3d Pursuit Squadron were divided between Lieutenant Wagner’s I 7th Squadron, which now was transferred to Clark Field, and the 2 1st Squadron at Nichols Field. At the same time, personnel of the ground echelon were dis- tributed among these and other units in order to bring them nearer up to ~trength.‘~Every effort was made to strengthen antiaircraft defenses, which had proved ineffective against both high-level bomb- ing and low-altitude attacks. The Manila area seemed particularly 2 1 3
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