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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 A R M B E T W E E N T W O W A R S Army (15 October 1935). Ostensibly a compromise, this manual in- clined toward the General Staff’s point of view. In listing functions of the GHQ Air Force “beyond the sphere of influence of the.Ground Forces,” it included strikes at “military and civil objectives alike”- air installations, shipping, munitions and aircraft factories, transporta- tion, etc. There is no effort to establish absolute priorities, since the relative importance of objectives varies with the situation, but the judgment is made that as targets “air forces [are] generally of primary importance.” 1 3 0 There were in T R 4 4 0 - 1 5 few statements to which the Air Corps could take exception, but its very lack of emphasis made it a weak instrument for indoctrination. T h e manual remained in force until 1940, but a sampling of Air Corps opinion during that interval u7ill indicate that its tenets were by no means universally accepted. Within the Air Corps two fairly distinct points of view may be discerned, but it is difficult to determine any principle of alignment within the several air agencies. One attitude, which for convenience may be called that of compromise, stressed on political grounds the defense mission of aviation, but as an interim rather than a permanent policy. This way of thinking may be seen in an Air Corps Tactical School critique of General Kilbdurne’s proposed doctrines and in a counterproposal of 3 I January 1935 called “Suggested Foundation for GHQ Air Force Doctrine.” l S 1 T h e latter starts with the assumption that “national policy, geographic location of bases and the present range of planes which does not permit the air attack of the national structure of any probable enemy, dictate the role of the GHQ Air Force as one of air defense and fix its true objective.” 13’ In keeping with this opinion, first priority is given to preventing an enemy from setting up air bases within range of the United States, second priority to defeat of enemy forces operating from such bases. Similar conclusions may be found in a study, “The Functions of the Army Air Forces,” presented by the Air Corps Board on 29 Oc- tober 1936. Assuming that, with current performance of aircraft, sustained attacks could not be carried out against the homeland of any major foreign power from bases in U.S. territory, the board declared that the Air Corps should be immediately and primarily concerned with national defense and the preservation of internal order. Until an adequate defense was assured, “the diversion of effort incident to preparations for strategically offensive operations is not justified.” 133 T h e real intention of this study was to secure for the Air Corps a 49
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