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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 Preparations in the United Kingdom The theater of operations in which the Eighth Air Force soon would make its debut had been for two years the scene of great air battles. By 1942 the Royal Air Force had become a battle-proved, experience-wise organization, with by far the greater part of its strength concentrated in the United Kingdom, whose defense was the cardinal point in British war policy. The establishment of another great air force in a country smaller than the state of Alabama (vir- tually all of the Eighth would be stationed in England proper), and one that was already crowded with airdromes and teeming with air traffic, would require all of the administrative skill, experience, and patience with which both the RAF and the AAF were endowed. The task of representing the AAF in the initial stages of what was to prove an extraordinarily successful collaboration had fallen to General Eaker. Although the Special Observer Group (SPOBS) , even before Pearl Harbor, had examined with leaders of the RAF some of the problems that would be involved in the accommodation of an American air force, it required the hard impact of actual war- fare to lend urgency and certitude to preparations for the partici- pation of the AAF in the European war. The advance echelon of the Bomber Command, Army Air Force in Great Britain under General Eaker was charged by General Arnold on 3 1 January to prepare for the arrival, accommodation, training, and operation of a bomber command.34Eaker and a party of six other officers reached England by air on 2 0 February and reported to Maj. Gen. James E. Chaney, commanding general of United States Army Forces British Isles (USAFBI) .35 The first American air headquarters in Europe, the United States Army Bomber Command, USAFBI, was established under command of General Eaker by order of General Chaney on z z February.86 Three days later Chaney directed Eaker and his small staff, in ac- cordance with previously made arrangements, to proceed to the head- quarters of RAF Bomber Command for the purpose of understudying its staff and drafting recommendations for the training, equipment, and employment of American air units scheduled to operate from the United Kingdom. Additional duties required examination of British airfields intended for use by the Americans, submission of a plan for the reception and assignment to stations of bomber units, and 618
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