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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
P L A N S , P O L I C I E S , A N D O R G A N I Z A T I O N warrant it, but if by 1 5 September an operation in the following spring should appear impracticable, a decision should be made to launch a combined attack against North and Northwest Africa at the earliest possible date before I December. This recommendation was accepted by the Combined Chiefs of Staff on the ~ 4 t h . ~ ‘Ap- parently Roosevelt gave his tentative approval in a telephone conver- sation on the following day.58 The provision to hold off until 1 5 September for a firm decision to mount TORCH, as the revived and revised GYMNAST plan was called, was wisely scrapped. It is diffi- cult to say just when the two governments made a formal commit- ment. On 3 0 July, Admiral Leahy told the Combined Chiefs of Staff, then back in Washington, that Roosevelt and Churchill “believed” that T O R C H was on; and so it was.59 Intensive planning began immediately in London. With an eye on French sensibilities, the CCS had preferred an American commander for the operation, and on 7 August, Lt. Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, who as commanding gen- eral of the European Theater of Operations had participated in the London conference, was informed of his appointment.“ Neither the new code name nor the choice of an American leader could obscure the fact that the strategy which had long guided JCS thought had been sharply wrenched if not broken. Planning for ROUNDUP-and even for an emergency SLEDGEHAMMER-was supposed to continue. But the Joint Chiefs in their memorandum of 24 July had realistically accepted the fact that T O R C H in 1942meant no ROUNDUP in 1943.~‘For the Army Air Forces this might mean a return to the time schedule suggested in AWPD/r, with its spring 1944 invasion, but the circumstances were to be importantly modified by TORCH. General Arnold had from March gone along with the War Depart- ment General Staff in its preference for SLEDGEHAMMER, though ROUNDUP would have fitted more aptly into AWPD’s concept of the war. Arnold was not in London in late July, but with other mem- bers of the JCS he had been opposed to TORCH. In July as in April the British had proposed, in partial substitution for the second front, an intensification of their bomber offensive over Germany, where recent thousand-plane attacks on Cologne and Essen had already given earnest of what was to come.62But T O R C H ruled out for the time being any effective participation in this campaign by the AAF, much as it was to their liking. Sir Charles Portal had raised the issue 573
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