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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.
“Italian Air Force”14 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 a t this time, it would see a large number of these forty-nine groups diverted to other air forces all over the world. In the reorganization of the Eighth Air Force and the subsequent feverish efforts to prepare it for movement overseas, the chief re- sponsibility was borne by General Spaatz, though his formal assump- tion of command did not come until 5 May.2z Brig. Gen. Asa N. Duncan and the headquarters staff of the Eighth Air Force were made responsible to him, and in early April the headquarters was split into two echelons. One remained in Savannah to care for the administrative and operational needs of the several commands. The other, the Bolling Field echelon, became the nerve center of the force itself. Located near AAF Headquarters in Washington, this element of the Eighth's staff worked in close conjunction with the Air Staff itself. At Bolling Field, after numerous conferences and studies, de- tails of the organization, mission, and training began to be transformed into functional Major decisions taken in April and May pro- vided the basis for concrete action to facilitate the removal of the Eighth to the United Kingdom, and shaped the organization that would be established during the spring and summer of 1942. The VIII Ground Air Support Command was established on 28 April 2 4 and the VIII Air Force Composite Command, which was intended as a training organization, on 4 July.26 Redesignations of commands during this period and in subsequent months transformed the Inter- ceptor Command into the Fighter Command, the Base Command into the Service Command, and the Ground Air Support Command into the Air Support Comrnande2' perienced officers for staff positions, it became necessary to commis- sion direct from civilian life large numbers of professional and business men who volunteered their services. Most of these men were commissioned for specific assignment to one of the staffs, a practice that was especially important in staffing the service command, which had perhaps the greatest immediate need for officer personnel.2' Many of the newly commissioned officers came from the southeastern part of the United States, where the several headquarters were then located, and many of them, having moved directly from civilian life to the assumption of their new responsibilities, went overseas without any military training whatsoever, a condition which was partially T o overcome the difficulty arising from a general dearth of ex- I 6 1 6
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