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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.
“King”32 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 inadequate communications frequently left no choice but to send him out with a general directive and leave him on his own. In immediate charge of the bombers at Malang was Col. Eugene L. Eubank of the V Bomber Command. From Malang it was 1,500 miles to Davao, the first target chosen. T o operate at this distance it would be necessary to stage through an intermediate base, and of possibilities at Kendari in Celebes and Samarinda in Borneo, the latter was selected. Storms and low visibility forced postponement of the initial mission, but on 3 January nine B-17’s reached Samarinda from Malang. Main- tenance personnel, who had flown up with the aircrews, then serviced the planes, loaded each with 2 , 0 0 0 gallons of roo-octane gasoline and four 600-lb. bombs, and in the early morning of the following day Maj. Cecil E. Combs led eight of the big planes off the field. H e headed for Davao Gulf, 730 miles away, which harbored at the time approxi- mately twelve enemy transports and perhaps twenty-four warships. As the bombers approached the objective after five hours of flight, they climbed to 25,000 feet and from this altitude scored hits which possibly sank a destroyer and, according to enemy accounts, severely damaged a cruiser. Opposition was slight, and four hours later the B- I 7’s landed unharmed at Samarinda. The planes returned to Malang on 5 January.31 Such were bombing operations during the early phase of the Nether- lands East Indies campaign. Three days of flying had been required to drop less than ten tons of bombs. The flights were made from unfa- miliar and inadequately equipped bases, over areas that were imper- fectly charted, and under circumstances which imposed at all times a maximum strain upon personnel. In selecting an advanced staging point for missions, attention had to be given not only to the location and condition of the field but also to the availability there of adequate stores of fuel and ammunition. The one mission through Samarinda had exhausted the supply of IOO- octane gasoline at that base; moreover, the field’s unpaved runway could be used by the heavily loaded aircraft only in dry weather. Accordingly, for a second mission to Davao it was decided to stage through Kendari, where a store of fuel and generally more satisfactory facilities existed. Nine of the B- I 7’s having left Malang on 8 January, Major Combs led them from Kendari on the following day in a second mission against enemy shipping in Davao Gulf. But mechanical diffi- culties plagued the flight; of the nine planes, only five succeeded in 378
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