“Nevers”44 pages
- p. 43 …cavalry mounted on gas driven flying horses” never arrived to
“sweep the Germans from the sky…
- p. 46 …Mitchell never received an American air force commensurate with
the ambitious idens of air power which…
- p. 49 …This project, like so many others, had lagged, and the Air Service was
never equipped during…
- p. 50 …the Army or the Air Corps?” but never, “Are
you in the Army or the Corps…
- p. 55 …any Air Service officers, and I have never heard
anybody yet-any Air Service officer-against…
- p. 69 …But one axiom,
with its corollaries, never varied. T o him the airplane was first and…
- p. 75 …Powerful air attacks resolutely pressed home could never be
completely stopped, but their effects could best…
- p. 94 …rate for the time being, the decision never-
theless left an open question as to how…
- p. 121 …large-scale warfare; production of combat types never exceeded 300
aircraft a month. The pattern of…
- p. 122 …the German Air Force, the
Regia Aeronautica never exhibited sufficient power to be decisive in
the…
- p. 133 …Except for a few raids against French
factories, the force had never been employed in a…
- p. 140 …into
a complete war economy production was never equal to the demands
of our own forces…
- p. 150 …Long-term needs
of the Air Corps and the sudden availability of funds in quantities
never…
- p. 181 …Actually, the Air Staff had
never approved of the method followed in RAINBOW No. 5 . l…
- p. 217 …Members of the Hawaiian Air Force, who had never flown
heavy bombers, began to receive intensive…
- p. 219 …were not then satisfactory for permanent garrisons. Never-
theless, the commander of the Hawaiian Department, Lt…
- p. 227 …T h e planes never reached their destination. Other
bombardment units were being prepared for transfer…
- p. 241 …responsible officers, a few crucial points
have never been satisfactorily explained.
T h e general pattern…
- p. 277 …motors, sole-
noids, and gun mounts-were never found. After many hours of fruit-
less search…
- p. 288 …planners and
from which AAF Headquarters was never to deviate.
The translation of the accepted grand…
- p. 303 …the principal features of the plan
were never challenged, it was subsequently revised in a draft…
- p. 309 …W a r Plans Division was
never incorporated into GHQ and remained a potential rival to…
- p. 336 …the shooting and wrote that they were never
able to make out an airplane.g6It is…
- p. 412 …As it happened, the B-24's never
returned to India, but, instead, remained in the…
- p. 457 …Meanwhile the Edsall with the remaining
pilots had headed for Java, never to be heard from…
- p. 492 …Squadron was assigned, but which it would never reach, going from
Australia to Tongatabu; ( 3 ) Christmas…
- p. 500 …deck of a carrier presented a problem never
before challenged by Army planes. Hence an accelerated…
- p. 502 …the bows and wetting the flight deck. Never before had this been
accomplished, yet now it…
- p. 509 …Island, in the
Louisiade Archipelago.” They were never needed, for on 7-8 May
the two…
- p. 513 …exist, it was at a point which never reached the
aircrews, for on the operational level…
- p. 524 …handicaps under which
AAF planes had operated. Never were more than fourteen B- I 7’s…
- p. 527 …AAF planners clung firmly to their belief that
proper observance of economy of force would never…
- p. 531 …Crews which had
previously never loaded torpedoes now for the first time fitted these
weapons into…
- p. 544 …But the Japanese never at
any time based their bombers in appreciable numbers a t either…
- p. 548 …26's in torpedo-dropping, but they never would be put into
All told, the record…
- p. 556 …until it had been thoroughly trained and never to com-
mit it piecemeal. General Magruder had…
- p. 560 …pressed into service against the Germans," and never reached the
CBI." Colonel Haynes had reached India…
- p. 606 …reason that the Antilles Air Task Force
never evolved, as did I Bomber Command, into an…
- p. 614 …that reason deserving a high
priority, could never dispose of the U-boat menace but must…
- p. 635 …In Washington the Munitions Assign-
ments Board t had never considered this schedule as more than…
- p. 670 …they bombed from 39,200 feet, and never
below 30,000. By AAF standards they had…
- p. 672 …Goering had never put enough bombers over England,
nor had he concentrated his forces on the…
- p. 690 …of co-operation and combined action probably never
before equaled by the military forces of two…
- p. 729 …shoot at aerial targets, and several
had never operated a turret in the air. This deficiency…
T H E P R O B L E M O F N E W G U I N E A
Between 24 April and 4 July, seventy B-25 sorties were flown
against Lae and Salamaua, to which number there were added eighty-
four B-26 sorties, forty-five by B - I ~ ’ s ,and twenty by RAAF Cata-
linas, Beauforts, and Hudsons. Insofar as was possible, the bombing
efforts of the several units were co-ordinated, as when, on 16 May,
fourteen B - 2 5 ’ ~and four B-26’s destroyed buildings, set fire to fuel
dumps, and damaged grounded aircraft at Lae. On 9 June, five B-25’s,
eleven B-26’s, and two B-17’s bombed the same target through an
overcast; and on 16 June, nine B-25’~,ten B-26’~,and three B-17’s
scored hits on runways and buildings. It was difficult to ascertain
the damage done. The weather was frequently unfavorable, and the
Japanese skillful at camouflage. Photographic reconnaissance indicated
that bombs often fell wide of the target, and the enemy continued
to add new taxiways and dispersal areas. But the Japanese never at
any time based their bombers in appreciable numbers a t either Lae
or Salamaua, and that was what counted. Indeed, Allied estimates,
based in part on information supplied by an RAAF officer who spent
months within sighting distance of Lae, indicated that enemy fighters
based on New Guinea rarely numbered more than forty.l9 These
were enough, however, to maintain a stubborn defense. Between 24
April and 4 July, three B-26’s and eleven B-25’s were lost in combat.
Especially heavy were the losses to an interception of 24 May. Eight
B-25’s of the 13th Squadron led by its commander, Capt. Herman F.
Lowery, and flying as usual without escort, cut through a pass in
the mountains, swept wide of Salamaua, and turned in toward Lae
from the east to be met head-on by a strong force of enemy fighters.
Six or seven of them were shot down, but Captain Lowery’s plane
burst into flames and dove into the ocean, and one by one four other
B-25’~went down. A sixth bomber crash-landed on its return to
Moresby.‘O As with the heavy bombers, Moresby served the mediums
only as a staging point.
More of the B-26’s would have been available for strikes at Lae
and Salamaua had it not been for the fact that during April and May
the 22d Group assumed a major responsibility for the run to Rabaul.
This, of course, was a job for the heavies, but on z April the 19th
Group had but six aircraft in commission, and through May and June
would average no more than seventeen B-17’s ready for combat, or
less than half its assigned strength. Moreover, one of its four squad-
rons, the 435th’ was reserved for reconnaissance duties, and repeatedly
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