“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…
D E F E N S E O F T H E W E S T E R N H E M I S P H E R E
dispersed to fields outside the Canal Zone, additional revetments were
hurriedly built, and camouflage was employed wherever possible.”
Air traffic regulations for the Canal Zone were revised to provide for
a defended zone extending ten miles on either side of the canal.’’
December 1941 was marked by invasion fears in Panama and
throughout the Caribbean region. Hostile carriers were reported on
8 December along the Pacific approaches to the canal. Again on 10
December the Navy reported that radio transmissions indicated a
concentration of enemy vessels to the west of the canal. T h e W a r
Department relayed a report that a carrier had been sighted off the
coast of Mexico.20O n the Ioth, convincing evidence was received to
the effect that the Vichy regime had turned over the French fleet to
the Germans.’l T h e next day one of the French vessels at Martinique
was reported to have left the harbor, and plans were drafted for joint
Navy and AAF action to meet what might be a new threat to the
Because of all these reports, a special alert was maintained for
several days throughout the Caribbean, and, as the tension approached
its height, an episode occurred which indicated the inexperience of
American forces. T h e incident came to be known as “the battle of
Borinquen,” from the air base in Puerto Rico where it took place.2s
Shortly after dark on 1 2 December, a report reached Borinquen Field
to the effect that a large enemy transport had dropped anchor in a bay
near by. Landing barges full of troops were said to be coming ashore.
A junior officer, without investigating the matter, alerted and blacked
out the field. A bomber was dispatched to attack the ship but, through
neglect, no bombsight was on board. Nevertheless, bombs were
dropped and small boats in the bay were strafed. Meanwhile guards at
the gates of the airfield saw tracer bullets, thought they detected sol-
diers approaching, and opened fire with machine guns, firing several
thousand rounds. T h e next day it was discovered that the affair had
been caused by an innocent American freighter which had been at
sea without radio communication and had not heard of the start of
war. T h e firing on shore was caused by the accidental discharge of the
rifle of a sentry, which had led to an extended exchange of fire between
adjacent guard posts; fortunately the aim was poor. The incident gave
proof of the need for better control of both ground and air personnel
and for more careful direction by experienced senior officers during
periods of alert. It indicated that much remained to be done before the
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