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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
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 Implications When the small force of B-17'~from VIII Bomber Command took to the air on 17 August 1942, they carried with them much more than a bomb load of trouble for the enemy. They carried with them a long heritage of debate and controversy. And they began an experi- ment in strategic bombardment which was destined to answer a num- ber of questions vitally affecting the entire course of the war in Europe. In the summer of 1942, Allied plans, both strategic and logis- tical, lay in a state of extreme uncertainty. Certain major decisions had been made, but only tentatively, and the over-all plan of the war remained the subject of open discussion at the highest Although basic Allied war plans had indicated Germany as global enemy No. I , it was still an open question to what extent US. heavy bombardment should be committed to operations in the European theater a t the expense of the Pacific. T o those responsible for the war against Japan, especially the US. Navy, it seemed by no means clear that the war against Germany should receive priority in air equip- ment, if indeed it should receive priority at all. And in July 1942 it had been decided that American commitments to BOLERO should be readjusted in the interests of offensive operation in the Pa~ific.~" A debate ensued as to the precise nature and extent of this planned diversion, a debate which continued through the late summer and early fall of that year, and which turned in large part on the ability of the American heavy bombers to do a job in Europe of sufficient strategic value to justify the degree of priority required for a major air offensive in that theater. In fact, it was not until the Casablanca conference in January 1943 that the full-scale bomber offensive envisaged by American and British air strategists was given an un- assailable place in Allied strategy. Meanwhile, it was up to the bomber units of the Eighth Air Force to demonstrate that they could bomb the enemy in broad daylight heavily enough and accurately enough and with a sufficiently low rate of loss to make the American part of the projected off ensive-the bombing of selected installations by day- a practicable reality. Then there was the question of priority in production, which in August 1942 was becoming the object of a prolonged and crucial controversy among American planners. A strategic bomber offensive 666
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