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The Army Air Forces in World War II, Vol. 1 (archived PDF)

Air Force Historical Studies Office · 863 pages · text from the file's own layer

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.

  • p. 303 …of Naval Opera- tions; Adm. Ernest J. King, Commander in Chief, U.S. Fleet; Gen. George…
  • p. 316 …So far as the Navy is concerned, Admiral King, as you know, is not only Chief…
  • p. 493 …Admiral King believed that the mines offered a tempting bait to the Japanese who were currently…
  • p. 526 …Hence Admiral King placed a bid for suffi- 461
  • p. 527 …t this stage of the war Admiral King had accepted the belief that his carrier planes…
  • p. 538 …plan by 2 9 June, when Admiral King submitted to the Joint Chiefs a proposal that…
  • p. 607 …type * O n 5 March 1942, Admiral King wrote to General Arnold as follows: “The experience…
  • p. 608 …s.’l A formal request by Admiral King to the Chief of the Army Air Forces…
  • p. 609 …In a letter of 9 March 1942 to Admiral King, he proposed “the estab- lishment of…
  • p. 614 …In June, Admiral King expressed the official Navy position on this point with the utmost clarity…
  • p. 615 …In a memorandum to Admiral King, General McNarney, Deputy Chief of Staff, on 26 May outlined…
  • p. 616 …viewed as a temporary deta~hment.?~ Admiral King’s reaction to these cautious proposals was expressed…
  • p. 618 …the same words as used by Admiral King a month earlier: the answer to the antisubmarine…
  • p. 621 …On 14 September, General Marshall wrote to Admiral King: “Experience with the First Bomber Command in…
  • p. 622 …T o General Marshall’s proposal of 14 September, Admiral King had replied that, although he…
  • p. 641 …54 A week later General Marshall, Admiral King, Harry Hopkins, and a small staff flew to…
  • p. 645 …that scheduled to operate from the United King- dom. Dry topic or no, organization must figure…
  • p. 684 …the principal air task in the United King- dom had long been conceived as strategic bombardment…
  • p. 707 …establishment of base depots in the United King- dom became the basis of action in January…
  • p. 724 …Implicit in all of the arrangements being made in the United King- dom was the belief…
  • p. 788 …Force, Pt. I ; Fleet Adm. Ernest J. King, First Official Report to the Secretary of the…
  • p. 793 …Memo for Adm, King from C/S, 17 Mar. 1 % ~ . 34. JPS 2I/j/D, 7…
  • p. 795 …4 Aug. 1942. 108. Zbid. 109. Adm. King’s Report on Battle of Midway, incl. in…
  • p. 797 …306, 29 June 1942; memos for Adm. King from Mar- shall, 26 June 1942, and for…
  • p. 802 …1942; CM-IN-0629, Chung- king to AGWAR, # # z , 3 Apr. 1942; memo for Gen. Arnold…
  • p. 805 …Ltr., Arnold to King, 2 5 Feb. 1942. certain evidence from all Allied and enemy sources…
  • p. 806 …Memo for King from McNarney, 26 May 1942. 7 1 . Ltr., King to Marshall, 10 June…
  • p. 807 …Ltr., Marshall to King, 14 Sept. 1942, TAB XIVA, in Bowles report; memo for C G…
  • p. 808 …to notes from Mar- shall and Adm. King). 3 2 . A I c m o for…
  • p. 814 …Forces to the United King- dom, App. A, 19 Aug. 1942. 50. Ltr., Col. H.L…
  • p. 851 …C.E., 48-50 Killin, Pfc, 219 Kilner Board, 1 2 0 Kimbolton, 63 I King…
  • p. 854 …in Chief, 515, 5 2 2 , 544. (see also King); controversy over air power vs. battleship…
C H A P T E R 8
* * * * * * * * * * *
AIR DEFENSE OF T H E
W E S T E R N H E M I S P H E R E
N ORDER flashed to air defense units in California shortly after
noon on 7 December 1941 brought word that the Japanese
A had attacked Hawaii, that 700 miles west of San Francisco
a transport had been sunk, that by direction of the Secretary of W a r
RAINBOW No. 5 had been put into execution, and that all bases
were to be alerted for attacks by air or gr0und.l That order was typi-
cal of many which on that day brought the war home to the United
States and its key outposts throughout the Western Hemisphere.
Overnight, air raid alerts and blackouts became routine in American
cities, as the average citizen assumed the additional duty of air raid
warden. T h e success of the attack on Hawaii had put the United
States on the defensive and suggested that the homeland itself was
not beyond the range of similar carrier-borne air assaults. For the first
time since the W a r of 1 8 1 2 the country faced a serious threat of
attack.
Estimates of the seriousness of the threat to continental United
States varied widely with the perspective of the men who made them.
Military planners, thinking in terms of world-wide strategy, were apt
to minimize a danger which to an individual in an exposed community
appeared to be highly personal and threatening. This emotional el;-
ment in the situation, the feeling that it took only one bomb to wipe
out a home, meant that in continental defense political factors were
no less important than strictly military considerations. T h e initial
reaction of the people in one of the more exposed areas was described
in an account written on 10December 1941by Richard L. Neuberger,
Oregon journalist: “People who had pooh-poohed any hint of peril on
Saturday kept their children home from school on Monday.” While
2 7 ’

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Document, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 863 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.