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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
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 route by both the Ferrying Command and the contract airlines. These flights went only as far as Goose Bay during the winter, but by April they were going all the way to the British Isles. Early in April, Lt. Col. Milton W. Arnold, a member of the Ferrying Command operations staff, was ordered to make a general survey of the route and to deter- mine the feasibility of flying fighter aircraft to Britain. His report was altogether pessimistic, although he raised no question as to the possi- bility of ferrying the lighter types of aircraft. H e found operational facilities generally, and especially those for weather and communica- tions services, as yet in a low state of efficiency. Colonel Arnold recom- mended that a qualified officer be given the job of flying the route continuously, armed with full authority by the W a r Department to take whatever corrective action might be found necessary. Arnold himself was given the job by Army Air Forces but his authority was limited to that of recommending, rather than ordering, remedial action to correct existing deficiencies. Accompanied by the regional weather and communications officers, he kept the route under constant surveil- lance during the months immediately preceding the movement of the Eighth Air Force and monitored the earliest flights after the movement started.' As an example of some of the fundamental problems still remaining to be overcome, it may be noted that on one of the survey flights dur- ing May Arnold found practically no weather information was being relayed between Iceland, Greenland, and eastern Canada, even though stations were scattered all through the area a t that time. "Actual mes- sages were found in which forecasts were requested from Gander and Presque Isle and were delivered fifteen days later to Greenland, and in another case, twenty-nine days later.77140Little more than a month remained before the scheduled movement of the Eighth was to begin, a movement that obviously would be impossible under such conditions. Arnold and his associates worked continually a t the job of instructing inexperienced weather and radio personnel, replacing those altogether unqualified, installing new radio equipment, and devising a simpler weather code.14' Considerable improvement had been made by late June, though the organization of fully dependable weather and com- munications services continued to demand the attention of responsible officers. T h e story of the actual movement of the air echelon of the Eighth Air Force across the North Atlantic to the British Isles will be con- 348
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