“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 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
new de~tination.’~’The critical hour had come in the Pacific, and all
available planes were moving west-west from Hawaii to Midway,
from Hamilton and March to Hickam, and westward across the
North American continent to fill the vacuum created on the Pacific
coast by departures for Hawaii and the Aleutians, where the enemy
also was expected. O n z June the War Department ordered the 97th
Bombardment Group and the 1st Fighter Group to the West Coast
on assignment to the Western Defense Command.140They would be
released in approximately a week from this new and
would return to New England from the Pacific coast to resume
preparations for their trans-Atlantic movement, but the resultant
delay occasioned by this emergency cost at least two weeks.*
The 3 1 s Fighter Group had been ordered on 4 June to proceed to
England, but without the B-17’~of the 97th to lead the P-39’s across
it was not considered practicable to move the unit by air.142And so
the 3 1st went by water, and having left its planes in the United States
for the lack of space, it reached England by the middle of June to
take up its station at Atcham and High Ercall west of H ~ n t i n g d 0 n . l ~ ~
In lieu of the P-39’s left behind, the unit promptly acquired RAF
Spitfires, in which it began training almost at once.144Thus it came
about that the first complete American combat group in the European
theater entered battle with British planes. It was not alone in this par-
ticular for it was followed in July and August by the 5zd Fighter
Group, which also made its movement by water and was equipped in
the theater with Spitfires.145
Meantime, preparations had been pushed for the delayed move-
ment of the 97th, the Ist, and the 60th. O n 15 June, General Spaatz,
stopping at BLUIE W E S T I in his flight across the North Atlantic,
advised Arnold by radio that all B-17’~not needed for escort of the
P-38’s should proceed without delay, and that the pursuits should
follow not later than 2 1 June, by which time the C-47’s should also
be ready.146 O n the 18th the VIII Fighter Command from its tem-
porary headquarters at Grenier Field issued orders for the movement:
* On 2 June, the 97th left the concentration area and flew across the country in
two separate elements, one to McChord Field, Washington, by way of Mitchel Field,
Ft. Leavenworth, and Boise; and the other to Hammer Field, Fresno, California, by
way of Scott Field and Albuquerque. On I I June both elements left the Pacific
coast, and by 18 June they had returned to their stations at Grenier and Dow fields.
The 1st Fighter Group left Dow Field on 5 June and flew to Morris Field, North
Carolina, on the first leg of its journey to the west. On 6 June it was ordered to
return to Dow Field and departed for there on the same day.
642