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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.
“The Wash”17 pages
C H A P T E R 9 * * * * * * * * * * * THE EARLY DEVELOPMENT OF AIR TRANSPORT AND FERRYING FACTOR underlying and shaping American strategy from the very first in World W a r 11was the great distance separat- A ing each of the active theaters of war from the main source of supply in the United States. In establishing overseas lines of supply, the armed forces had of necessity to rely most heavily on water transport. There was no other possible means of moving the bulk of the military forces and the enormous tonnages required to support large-scale operations so far from the home base. But the very nature of the war, and especially the urgent demands for a speedy reinforcement of our outposts during the first months of hostilities, made it imperative that a system of air supply be developed, supplementary to the older and slower methods of surface transport. The fastest and most economical method of moving combat aircraft from the factory to the front- which might be I 0,000 to I 5,000 miles away-was to ferry them under their own power. T o keep them in battle at their highest efficiency, an air transport service for the rapid delivery of spare engines and parts, auxiliary equipment of all kinds, flight crews, and ground per- sonnel was an absolute necessity. This, in the simplest terms, was the primary purpose of the long-range military air transportation system developed by the Army Air Forces, although it was put to many other uses during the course of the war.' The combined strategy devised by the British and American staffs at the Washington conference of December 1941 had embodied, in addition to a long-range plan of action, certain immediate objectives to be attained in 1942. These were, first, to make secure important areas of war production likely to be attacked, and second, to provide for the security of the principal sea routes and seven main air routes over 3 10
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