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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 received reports that the Japanese were occupying Florida Island from their transports lying in Tulagi harbor, and he resolved to strike a t once with his Yorktowm squadrons. At 0845 on the morning of the 4th, the attacks began upon Tulagi, and the enemy was surprised, los- ing a t least one destroyer, several smaller craft, and suffering damage on a minelayer, though the carrier’s pilots placed the losses somewhat higher.57 But this represented only a minor sting, for the ultimate enemy goal was Moresby, toward which the Japanese Admiral Hinoue had dispatched an occupation force of approximately five transports from Rabaul, plus a direct support force of four cruisers and the escort carrier Shoho from B ~ i n . ~ ~Shoho’s planes were to defend the trans- ports, but swinging down around the eastern side of the Solomons was the Japanese navy’s Carrier Division Five, including Z u i k a h and Shokaku, two of the navy’s newest; it would defend the entire Port Moresby occupation force, attack the U.S. carriers which the Japanese expected, and raid the Townsville area in an attempt to destroy Allied aircraft and shipping there. Out from Townsville and Moresby the B-25’s and B-I 7’s conducted their searches, and on 4 May a B-25 of the 90th Bombardment Squad- ron reported the sighting of a carrier and two heavy cruisers east of Port Moresby.” The plane, driven off by a swarm of fighters, lost con- tact. Next day another B-25 contacted a carrier south of Bougainville, shadowing the vessel for an hour and five minutes while sending out homing signals, hoping to guide B- I 7’s to the target.59At Townsville the 435th’~B-17’s were reinforced by four planes from each of the squadrons of the 19th Group, while a t Port Moresby 19 A-24 dive bombers were put on stand-by ready to carry their 500-lb. bombs against the enemy convoy coming down off Misima Island, in the Louisiade Archipelago.” They were never needed, for on 7-8 May the two Japanese forces were met by the US.carrier groups in the first of the fleet air engagements which were to characterize nearly all the Pacific naval actions. On the morning of the 7th, one of York- town’s scouts reported the sighting of two heavy and two light cruisers, but because the message was improperly coded, the combined air attack force was launched from the two carriers in the belief that two enemy carriers had been located. Meanwhile, the land-based * Allied Air Forces daily reconnaissance reports for 4 and 5 May show sightings of carriers with other heavy vessels on each of these days. The Navy’s lack of knowledge of these sightings is unexplained. 4-48
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