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

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
which men and supplies could be moved to the battlefronts2 While
the conference was still in session it had become clear that the Philip-
pines could not be held, principally because the Japanese had cut the
only sea and air lanes over which available reinforcements, such as
they were, could reach MacArthur. By the end of February 1942, the
air connection between India and Australia was also cut, although
some heavy bombers and other reinforcements from the United States
were able to get through before the Japanese captured Singapore and
overran the Netherlands East Indies. T h e Australia-Philippines and
the Australia-India air routes, included in the seven declared to be of
the highest strategic importance, were thus lost in the first shock
of the Japanese attack. Fortunately for the Allies, the five remaining
major routes were held. Each of the five had its beginning within the
continental United States and reached out from the main arsenal of
the United Nations to one or more of the major theaters of war: ( I )
the northeastern route, earliest to be developed for military purposes,
provided an air connection with Great Britain; ( 2 ) the northwest
route, with Alaska and the Russian front by way of Siberia; ( 3 ) the
South Pacific route, with Australia and the western Pacific islands;
(4) the southeastern route, with Africa, the Middle East, India, China,
and, for a brief time, the Southwest Pacific area; and ( 5 ) the mid-
Atlantic route, with Europe and North Africa by way of the Azores.
While this fifth trunk route was not opened until late 1943, the
United States and Great Britain were at all times prepared to occupy
the Azores had the security and future use of the route been threatened
by the Axis.
During the early period of American participation in the war the
southeastern route to Africa and beyond assumed an importance far
surpassing that of any of the o t h e r ~ . ~In contrast to the slowness with
which the North Atlantic route, as well as the newly developed South
Pacific and Alaskan routes, came into use during the months following
7 December, the South Atlantic airway was forced a t once to support
a heavy volume of air traffic that strained its facilities and personnel
to the limit. Lend-lease aircraft and supplies were sent over the route
to the British forces in Egypt and to the Russians through Iran, with
a smaller volume going via India into China. The earliest heavy bomber
reinforcements sent to American air forces in the Southwest Pacific
following the Japanese attack were moved over the route, as were
most of the aircraft and crews that would form the nuclei of the Ninth
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