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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 A R M B E T W E E N T W O W A R S tion to strict budgetary limits, the mission assigned to the air force denies the necessity for a full exploration of the independent function of the air weapon, the experimental program faces a double hazard. T h e Air Corps Act of 1926 had the effect of shifting the emphasis from experimental development to the procurement of standardized equipment. In addition to fixing the authorized strength of the Air Corps at just over to,ooo men of all ranks, the section of the act calling for a five-year program of expansion set as the goal a force of 1,800 planes. Such an objective did not necessarily preclude the possibility of a continued and vigorous experimental program. But over the en- suing five years appropriations requested by the Air Corps were cut through action of the War Department and the Bureau of the Budget on an average of close to 40 per cent.16’ And while annual appropria- tions now averaged over twenty-five million, or approximately double the appropriation for 1924, the Air Corps’ allotment of funds to re- search and development remained at the figure of just over two million to which it had fallen since that year. N o t until the fiscal year 1933 would the sum allotted to these purposes again exceed three million dollars.‘ It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that some of the criticism of experimental work in the Air Service after the war had sprung from a lack of sympathy with the broad objectives of the Army’s airmen. As late as 1936 the Air Corps would be charged in an official report with having been led astray by the allurement of a quest for the ultimate in aircraft performance at the expense of practical military need.le3 But technical and financial limitations, together with an incomplete development of Air Corps doctrine, apparently prevented the raising of any serious doctrinal issue in connection with the materiel program until the late 1920’s.As already noted, even Billy Mitchell had emerged from his experiences in World W a r I with the conviction that pursuit represented the most important branch of military aviation, a view that found reflection in the experimental program of the Air Service. T h e observation plane also received much of the Engineering Divi- sion’s attention in the search for a substitute for the DH-4 of World War I, and the official designation of “attack” plane had its origin in 1922 to describe observation types specially equipped for ground strafing. As for the bombers developed, technical barriers kept their performance well within limits that would be considered appropriate for a mission in support of ground armies.’” 57
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