“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 R M Y A I R F O R C E S I N W O R L D W A R I 1
enemy land-based aviation, it was already apparent that American
bomber operations would be still further restricted. Even before the
completion of these missions of the 10th it had become apparent that
Clark Field was no longer suited for service even as a staging point for
bomber operations. By the close of the next day all of the B-17’s but
one, which came in from Cebu on the 13th, had fallen back on the
Mindanao base.70
If any doubt persisted as to the necessity for this move, that doubt
had been removed by a heavy Japanese attack on Nichols Field and
the naval base a t Cavite just after midday on the 10th. At I I I 5 , inter-
ceptor headquarters received specific warning of enemy aircraft
approaching from the north, and for their interception dispatched
planes of the 17th Squadron to Manila Bay, of the 21st to the port
area of the city, and of the 34th to Bataan. A large number of enemy
bombers escorted by an estimated IOO fighters roared over Nichols
Field and Cavite, systematically bombing and strafing air installations,
docks, and supply centers. American pursuits were overwhelmed in
their attempts to break up the enemy’s bomber formations. The
experience of the 17th Squadron, whose ten p-40’~found themselves
confronted by a force of some fifty bombers and forty fighters, was
typical of the action. When the Americans undertook to engage the
bombers, enemy fighters thwarted almost every effort, and after some
minutes the P-40’s were forced to break away because of a shortage
of fuel. One pilot, Lt. William M. Rowe, shook off pursuing enemy
fighters by taking “a long dive a t the ground,” and made for Del Car-
men Field north of Manila only to find the field under a strafing
attack. Turning back toward Clark Field, he landed there safely with
no more than two gallons of fuel left. In the engagement, the Ameri-
cans had lost three planes with no apparent damage to the enemy.”
At Cavite the power plant, industrial facilities, and supply depots had
been “completely ruined.” The submarine Sea Lion had been sunk
and other naval craft damaged.” The Interceptor Command, now
left with only thirty pursuit aircraft, including eight outmoded P-3 5’s
and not counting one or two virtually useless P-26’s, could no longer
promise for either air or naval installations even a semblance of ade-
quate prote~tion.~’It was immediately decided to conserve the few
planes remaining by using them chiefly for purposes of reconnais-
sance-a decision which meant that our bases on Luzon would be even
more vulnerable to enemy air attack than before.74
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