Chapter 9: The Casablanca Directive
The decision to abandon an early invasion of Europe in favor of TORCH left Allied strategy in what may now seem a state of surprisingly unstable equilibrium. By some, particularly by the U.S. Navy, it was apparently taken as a signal for a radical reorientation of policy, amounting even to a shift from the strategic offensive against Germany to the strategic offensive against Japan. At best the balance between these two concepts, as early agreed upon, had been a delicate one. In the spring of 1942 the President had found it necessary to intervene in order to prevent BOLERO from being slowed down.1 And although it was the intention of those who advocated the North African campaign to do no more than postpone BOLERO and ROUNDUP (if, indeed, they admitted the necessity of any delay at all), the fact remained that, in shifting to TORCH, they had altered the basis for planning, as far as the immediate future was concerned. At the very least, they had opened the subject of basic strategy to a searching review.
Discussion began promptly after the tentative adoption of the TORCH plan on 24 July 1942. Representatives of the Navy made it clear that in their estimation Allied strategy was in the process of reorientation, not only in the direction of the Mediterranean but also toward the Pacific.2 Regarding the deployment of air forces in particular, the Navy representatives argued, in effect, that the build-up of air strength in the United Kingdom had been an integral part of the BOLERO-ROUNDUP plan, that its purpose was to support the invasion of Europe, and that, since ROUNDUP no longer constituted the primary project, aircraft could now be considered as a separate feature, committed to the war against Germany only insofar as they were required
by TORCH and operations in the Middle East. Admiral Leahy pointed out that, whatever commitments were contemplated, it would have to be understood that U.S. forces then operating in the Southwest Pacific “must and will be maintained.” Admiral Cooke referred significantly to the equipping of a large number of island air bases.3
There had even been some talk, while conversations were still being held regarding TORCH, of shifting to the offensive in the Pacific. The critical question at that point was whether the U.S.S.R. would continue to be an effective ally. Should she succeed in her battle to hold off the German army, there would be no doubt about the need for maintaining the maximum pressure on Germany. If, however, Soviet resistance were to collapse, Navy spokesmen urged that the maximum Allied effort, or that of the United States at any rate, should be shifted to the war against Japan. In any case, they insisted that Allied strategy had become too specialized and that production of weapons should be so balanced as to meet more than one eventuality.4
As far as the air war was concerned, the entire case presented by the proponents of the Pacific strategy appeared to AAF observers to rest on two fundamental misconceptions regarding current plans – in addition of course to the Navy’s highly developed sense of responsibility for a theater of operations peculiarly its own. In the first place, the Navy had erred in considering the projected bomber offensive from the United Kingdom by USAAF planes to be inseparable from the notion of air support for a European invasion. If support of ground and sea operations had been the principal mission of the heavy bombers, then it would have been perfectly logical to argue that once those operations had been indefinitely postponed so likewise had the need for the heavy bomber activity which was to support them. But to do so was obviously to misinterpret the nature of the strategic bombardment program. Both the English and American air representatives among the Combined Planners stoutly maintained that long-range attacks on German industry and communications had been and must continue to be considered as a project preliminary to but otherwise quite independent of any European invasion – a separate offensive operation in a theater which the postponement of invasion had made for the immediately foreseeable future entirely an air theater. To all of these arguments the Navy spokesmen replied that the maximum pressure of air bombardment could only be maintained when coordinated with ground and sea operations.5
According to the AAF way of thinking, there was also a tendency among both naval and ground men to misinterpret the role of air power in the TORCH strategy itself. General Arnold and the AAF planners had not found it easy to reconcile TORCH with their original conception of a combined bomber offensive from the United Kingdom. They had accepted the plan only after strenuous debate, and during the remainder of 1942 they continued to consider it a diversion from the main business of bombing the sources of German war power.6 Having accepted it, however, they were concerned to implement it as decisively as possible, and as the plan unfolded they were ready enough to see certain putative advantages accruing to the air arm in the way of alternate bases of operations and a resulting flexibility of planning.7 TORCH was, they believed, an extremely dangerous mission which would require the use of all air forces not engaged in essential operations elsewhere. At the same time, they considered bombing operations from the United Kingdom, at the expense of which any diversions to Africa must obviously be made, to be not only of primary importance in the longer perspective but an immediately essential part of the TORCH plan. In addition to providing air forces in support of African land operations, it would be necessary to leave a striking force in the United Kingdom to contain a substantial portion of the Luftwaffe in northwestern Europe, and so to prevent it from concentrating dangerously against the Allied forces in the Mediterranean and Africa. Air forces in the Middle East would also contribute toward this objective of dispersing the enemy air power. Conversely, air operations in Africa and the Middle East would contribute to the success of the bomber offensive from the United Kingdom, even though the latter had been somewhat depleted in order to make such air activity possible in the south. Although definitely a diversion, the African project would tend to disperse German air strength and thus make the bombing of Germany an easier matter.8
From this point of view, the European and North African and Middle Eastern areas of conflict became one theater as far as air operations were concerned. The AAF even hoped to exploit the mutually complementary nature of those operations to the fullest extent possible by uniting them under one air commander-who, incidentally, could see to it that combat units diverted to Africa would be returned, upon completion of their mission or during periods of minimum activity, for
the major bombardment campaign from the United Kingdom.* Meanwhile, the AAF was content to strike at Germany from · my available bases and recognized the supposed advantages to be obtained in the Mediterranean areas in the way of fine bombing weather and the eventual accessibility of Italian industrial objectives.9
In this way it was possible for AAF planners (with substantial backing from General Marshall and OPD) to rationalize TORCH without too seriously compromising their original idea of a combined bomber offensive against Germany. But it was a rationale in which the air requirements of the United Kingdom enjoyed a much stronger position than they did in Navy thinking. As a matter of fact, the AAF interpretation of the TORCH strategy, arising as it did out of strictly air considerations, was not at first shared by all Army authorities. Certainly General Eisenhower was prepared in September 1942 to bring bombing operations from the United Kingdom to a complete halt if necessary in order that Eighth Air Force resources might be devoted entirely to preparing for TORCH.10
Problems of Strategy and Control
The official AAF position, originally outlined in AWPD-1 in September 1941, was reaffirmed with little essential change in September 1942. In answer to a request from the President for a statement of the requirements of the Army and Navy and of U.S. production for the Allies “in order to have complete air ascendancy over the enemy,”11 AAF planners issued on 9 September a document known as AWPD-42, which served as the basis for all AAF strategic planning prior to the Casablanca conference of January 1943.
The authors of AWPD-42 held that it would not be possible to mount an effective air offensive simultaneously against both Germany and Japan. with the resources available, especially in view of the fact that U.S. air forces would have to be employed also in support of land operations in North Africa, the Middle East, and Burma, in support of amphibious operations in the South and Southwest Pacific, and in connection with antisubmarine patrol and hemisphere defense. In a choice between Germany and Japan, all considerations still favored Germany as the objective of first priority. Allied armed forces were not within striking distance of Japanese military strength at its vital sources. A sustained
* See above, pp. 61–66.
† See Vol. I, pp. 145–50.
air offensive could not therefore be waged against Japan unless use of the Soviet maritime provinces was secured, a doubtful contingency. The European situation, on the other hand, presented excellent opportunities for effective use of the air weapon. Indeed, in the initial stages of a war against the European Axis, air power alone could be brought directly to bear against Hitler’s stronghold.
As the AAF planners saw it, the strategic outlook in Europe was as follows. By the time the air strength contemplated in AWPD-42 could be made ready for employment, large Axis ground forces might well be released from the Russian front for action elsewhere. Thus, with ground forces of the Allied nations numerically inferior to those available for deployment by the Axis on the western front, it would be necessary to depend heavily upon numerically superior Allied air forces, which should be used to deplete the air power of the enemy and to undermine the economic structure which supported his land forces. For 1943 and the early part of 1944, priority should accordingly be given to an air offensive against Germany. When that operation was successfully accomplished, as it could be by mid-1944 if the over-all requirements of 63,068 combat aircraft for 1943 were met, it would then be feasible to mount a combined land offensive against Germany and an air offensive against Japan, either successively or simultaneously, in the latter part of 1944.
The projected air offensive against Germany would take the form of a combined strategic bombardment offensive such as both U.S. and British airmen had contemplated since the entry of the United States into the war. The USAAF, with an operational bomber force of 2,225 planes deployed in the European theater by January 1944, would concentrate on the “systematic destruction of selected vital elements of the German military and industrial machine through precision bombing in daylight.” The RAF would concentrate upon “mass air attacks of industrial areas at night, to break down morale,” an effort expected, in view of an assumed shortage of skilled labor in Germany, to have a “pronounced effect upon production.”12
The policy thus enunciated was one to which General Arnold was personally devoted and in which he was enthusiastically supported by Generals Spaatz and Eaker.13 Some doubts arose during the fall of 1942 as to the suitability of the United Kingdom as a base for a day bomber offensive because of the dismal data compiled regarding weather conditions in northwestern Europe. But these doubts, insofar as they
affected basic strategic planning, were of minor importance. At most it was seriously debated whether the heavy bomber force should, in event of a successful invasion of North Africa, be moved to bases on the Mediterranean during the winter months where weather conditions at that season presumably would be much more favorable to precision bombing than in the United Kingdom.14 Moreover, it was confidently expected that improvement in blind-bombing techniques would successfully circumvent conditions of poor visibility.
Throughout AAF thinking there may be detected the well-founded fear that U.S. air forces would be dispersed to all parts of the globe in answer to particular local needs but without reference to anyone strategic plan by which the strength of the AAF could be concentrated with decisive effect. Remarking to his staff in August 1942 that a war could not be won with forces scattered all over the world, Arnold insisted that theater commanders in minor theaters be instructed to get along with a minimum air force so that “an overwhelming number” of planes would be available in major theaters. “We have,” Arnold told his staff, “an education job as well as an allocation job.” In another connection he asserted that successful air operations depended on “the continuous application of massed air power against critical objectives.”15 This doctrine of the concentration of force was fundamental to all AAF strategic planning and was, of course, especially applicable to the proposed bomber offensive from the United Kingdom.16
Appreciating the fact that all Allied commanders did not fully share this point of view and anticipating a battle over the entire problem of diversions from the United Kingdom, AAF Headquarters took steps to convert the doubtful and to assemble an impressive array of opinion in support of its strategic policy. In late August, General Spaatz was requested to enlist the aid of key commanders in the theater, for it was feared that unless such support could be obtained “we stand a chance of having our air strength there so dissipated by diversions elsewhere as to be only a token effort.”17 Another and similar request was made on the completion of AWPD-42 in September.18
Partly, no doubt, as a result of General Spaatz’ influence, Eisenhower indorsed the idea of the interdependence of air operations in all African and European areas. On 5 September he sent a message to General Marshall in which he made the point that the United Kingdom was one of the few places in the world at that time in a position both to support operations of the TORCH forces and to strike at the heart of the principal
enemy. Moreover, it was a place where continuity of action could be counted on through the air operations of the British. It would therefore be necessary, he stated, to capitalize on these advantages. He planned if necessary to use the entire U.S. air force that was in the United Kingdom in support of TORCH. Operating over western Europe, the air force could contain a large part of the Luftwaffe in the north and, when necessary, could be shifted temporarily to African bases. Accordingly he requested that a strong force, especially of heavy bombers, be maintained in the United Kingdom, amounting by 15 October 1942 to ten heavy bomber groups and five fighter groups. He urged the deployment in the United Kingdom of twenty heavy bomber, ten medium bomber, and ten fighter groups by 1 January or sooner if possible.19 In view of the service being performed by Eighth Air Force bombers in the United Kingdom, General Eisenhower also was prevailed upon to rescind on 12 September his earlier order terminating bombing operations there in favor of TORCH. Other messages, including opinions from Generals Patton, Clark, and Spaatz, supported his estimate of air requirements and gave substance to the idea that air forces deployed in Europe and Africa should be considered as mutually complementary.20
These communications arrived in Washington, as AAF Headquarters had hoped, just in time for a critical debate in the JCS over fifteen groups reallocated in July from BOLERO to the Pacific. On 28 August the Joint U.S. Strategic Committee had submitted a report to the Joint Staff Planners on the detailed deployment of these units. It was assumed that the provisions of CCS 94, which had authorized the diversion, were binding and, with critical operations well under way on Guadalcanal, there was no discussion regarding where the diverted air units should be deployed when ready, but Army and Navy members disagreed radically as to when they were to be made available. The Army representatives maintained that no withdrawal should be made from BOLERO, except for one heavy bombardment group already ordered to the Pacific, until TORCH, the Middle East, and the United Kingdom, in that order, had been brought up to strength in air units as indicated in CCS 91, dated 7 July 1942. The Navy proved willing to admit the importance of TORCH and of commitments to the Middle East but insisted that the South and Southwest Pacific be given precedence over the United Kingdom, which thus would fall into the position of fifth and lowest priority.21 Support for the Navy’s position came in a
flood of requests from the Pacific during August and September for additional aircraft. Nor did these requests necessarily embody only the naval point of view. Maj. Gen. Millard F. Harmon, commanding general of U.S. Army Forces in the South Pacific, like all commanders in active theaters, strove vigorously to secure reinforcement for his command; and in view of the brisk fighting then taking place in those parts, he had a better talking point than most.22
To accept the lowest priority for BOLERO, it was estimated, would be to prevent any significant increase in the force of U.S. bombers in the United Kingdom for the rest of the year.23 But it appears that General Arnold’s opposition was based on considerations larger than the immediate effect upon the bombardment campaign in Europe. Only two of the fifteen groups in question belonged to the critical category of heavy bombers, and one of these had apparently already been irretrievably lost to the Pacific.* Arnold was chiefly concerned to preserve against unnecessary diversion the projected strategic bombardment program and to protect a necessary priority for the war against Germany. It is not surprising, therefore, that he fought the threat of further diversion of AAF units to the Pacific with every possible argument and with the weightiest military opinion available.
On the one hand, he reiterated the standard AAF strategic doctrine: that Germany was the chief enemy, that for many months to come the only way of striking offensively and decisively at Germany’s vitals was by aerial bombardment, and that, in view of the need for coordinated air effort in both Europe and Africa during the forthcoming TORCH campaign, those theaters must be considered mutually complementary. In addition, he pointed out that diversions to the Middle East, to TORCH, and now to the Pacific left only twenty-five of the fifty-four groups contemplated in the BOLERO-ROUNDUP plan – even on paper. On the other hand, he argued not only that the Pacific areas had on hand enough aircraft to keep the Japanese at bay but that they lacked adequate base facilities for any substantial increase in air strength.24 Army intelligence estimated that American air forces in the Pacific, amounting to a total of some 5,000 planes (including those carrier-borne), already outnumbered the Japanese air force, which would not likely reach 4,000 before the spring of 1943.25 As for the capacity of Pacific bases, Arnold decided to inspect them personally to determine at first hand what facilities were available. JCS discussions
* See again, pp. 61–62.
accordingly were recessed on 15 September pending his return from the inspection.26 The result of his personal investigation was registered on 6 October in a stated belief that there were in the general area the maximum number of aircraft which base facilities could handle.27
Within a week, it was clear that JCS discussions had reached a virtual deadlock. Admiral King was willing to concede priority to North Africa and the Middle East, although he felt that neither exceeded in immediacy the needs of the critical campaign in the South Pacific. But both he and Admiral Leahy were unalterably opposed to giving the bomber offensive from the United Kingdom precedence over any operations in the Pacific.28
Meanwhile, the military situation in the South Pacific had become so critical that, on 24 October, President Roosevelt intervened. In an urgent memo to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, he declared it to be necessary at all costs to hold Guadalcanal29 and added: “We will soon find ourselves engaged on two active fronts and we must have adequate air support in both places even though it means delay in our other commitments, particularly to England. Our long range plans could be set back for months if we fail to throw our full strength in our immediate and impending conflicts.” The President’s action had the effect of settling the problem of diversion* for the time being on the ground of unavoidable military necessity without seriously prejudicing either the case for the war against Germany or that for the strategic bomber offensive from the United Kingdom. His memo gave temporary priority to the urgent demands of the Pacific but, by its silence on the subject of basic strategy, it implied a strict adherence to the status quo. And so ended the first and in a sense the decisive phase of the controversy. Never again were the claims of the Pacific presented with so great determination, and when the problem of diversion again arose, it concerned the Mediterranean rather than the Pacific.
American air commanders had become reconciled to the prospect of a minimum bombing effort from the United Kingdom for the rest of 1942 and had even been able to see in a rapid and decisive North African campaign the promise of ultimate assistance to the strategic bombing effort. As early as 17 September, AAF Headquarters had proposed the creation of a single air theater embracing all operations against the European Axis.30 Such an over-all command would make it possible to capitalize on the flexibility and mobility inherent in air
* See Volume IV for air deployment in SOPAC.
power; planes not only could be moved when necessary from the United Kingdom to Africa with a minimum of confusion but they could be brought back to the United Kingdom as the occasion dictated with equally little administrative difficulty. The proposed “theater air force” had still another virtue. As General Spaatz put it late in October: “One of the principal advantages to establishing a single European Air Theatre is that it will have greater influence in attracting forces to this side of the world rather than to the Pacific.”31 The English weather in October, moreover, made the possibility of operating a bomber force from Mediterranean bases a reasonably attractive prospect.
Late in that month, conversations between Spaatz and Eisenhower resulted in the first formal step toward establishing the proposed theater air force. A plan of 19 November, involving the Eighth and Twelfth Air Forces only, charged the commanding general of the USAAF in the European theater with the duty of advising the theater commander on all matters in which USAAF units in ETOUSA were concerned, of commanding all AAF units in the theater, of preparing plans for their operations, and of coordinating strategic plans and operations with the RAF.32 General Eisenhower was inclined to postpone action on this plan until the capture of Tunisia, by providing the desired air bases, had removed the problem from the sphere of academic discussion.* But on 15 November, Arnold wrote to both Spaatz and Eisenhower expressing again his concern that “unless we are careful, we will find our air effort in Europe dispersed the same way we are now dispersed all around the world.” Air operations in Europe, he declared, must be planned and controlled by one man; and as the man for the job, he suggested General Spaatz.33 Consequently, Eisenhower decided to act at once, to the extent at least of giving the plan informal effect.34 On 1 December, Spaatz was transferred to Africa as Eisenhower’s air adviser, leaving Eaker in command of the Eighth.35
To give this informal air organization official status would require time. Any final reorganization, moreover, would have to take into consideration a proposal made by the British chiefs of staff, on or about 1 December, for control of all Allied air forces in the Mediterranean area under the command of Air Chief Marshal Tedder. Eisenhower, insisting that his problem was “immediate and critical” and “not to be confused nor its solution postponed by deliberate study of an overall
* For a discussion of the proposed theater air force from the point of view of the North African theater, see above, pp. 60–66, 105–7.
system of air command,” hoped that a stopgap arrangement with Spaatz acting as his deputy for air in North Africa would tide him over until such time as long-term plans could be made.36 To Arnold and his staff in Washington, however, the problem remained one of achieving an eventual unification of all air efforts in Europe, Africa, and the Middle East.37
Indeed, General Arnold was no longer content merely to place all U.S. air forces operating against the European Axis under one command. He wished also to include those of the British under a single Allied air commander. On 10 December he put the problem to Sir Charles Portal:
The recent air operations in North Africa have confirmed my opinion that the United Nations air effort against the European Axis should be unified under the command of one supreme commander. At the present time we are carrying on an air war against Germany and Italy by more or less unrelated air efforts from the United Kingdom, North Africa, and the Middle East. Our efforts are being opposed by a very efficient air force, integrated by a very capable supreme air commander, Goering.38
In this, as in the matter of the over-all U.S. air command, Arnold had uppermost in his mind the strategic air offensive. To General Spaatz he wrote:
By appropriate unification of command the North African bases made available by TORCH . . . may be used to substantial advantage in the prosecution of our basic strategic plan for offensive air action against the European Axis. Without such unification the North African front is apt, I believe, to prove a seriously deterring factor in the effective employment of our air arm as a striking force.39
As if to emphasize the point of these last remarks, the foundations of Allied strategy were shifting once more in the direction of the Mediterranean. In November, Mr. Churchill had argued in favor of attacking the “underbelly” of the European monster, and the British chiefs of staff again registered their opposition to any plan for an invasion of western Europe before such time as Germany showed definite signs of weakening. It was their belief that Allied strategy should depend in the immediate future upon the strategic bombardment of Germany from the United Kingdom and an amphibious campaign in the Mediterranean to exploit TORCH.40
However welcome to the AAF may have been the emphasis on strategic bombardment, a project for exploiting TORCH was contemplated by the U.S. Joint Chiefs with profound misgivings. It had been a cardinal principle in U.S. strategic doctrine to defeat Germany
by a cross-Channel invasion of western Europe mounted at the earliest feasible moment. That invasion had been postponed once. Operations “subsequent to TORCH” would probably involve further postponement in favor of a campaign which, inasmuch as it did not contribute directly to the plans for the invasion of Germany, had to be considered an indecisive and therefore an inadvisable effort.41 On 27 November the Joint Strategic Survey Committee assured the JCS that the basic United Nations strategy, as originally conceived, was sound. But on that same day a CPS subcommittee, appointed on 19 November to study the problem of further action in the Mediterranean, recommended exploitation of TORCH by means of a campaign against Sicily.42
To that proposal, the USAAF member of the subcommittee registered vigorous objection. With the RAF already and irrevocably committed to the large-scale bombing of German cities, the prospect of a post-TORCH venture in the Mediterranean raised a question, in the view of the AAF at least, chiefly of the further dispersal of American air forces. Admitting certain advantages in an attack on Sicily, the AAF representative maintained that “the heart of Germany’s capacity to wage war is in Germany,” that a strategic bomber offensive alone could at the moment strike effectively at that objective, and that any unnecessary diversion which would reduce the effectiveness of the bomber offensive should not be undertaken. Following a TORCH victory, he advocated that such forces as might be spared from the defense of Allied positions in the Mediterranean area should be made available for the strategic air offensive against the European Axis. North Africa should at the same time be developed as an efficient air operating area, auxiliary to the United Kingdom and capable of maintaining air units from the United Kingdom with a minimum transfer of ground personnel. In this way, Mediterranean shipping could be protected and Italian objectives could be bombed by long-range bombers during periods when weather in the north proved unfavorable to precision bombardment. It followed that North Africa and the United Kingdom should be considered as one theater, in which an extremely flexible air arm might be maintained on the perimeter of Axis Europe.43
As this paper indicates, the AAF had remained firm in its adherence to the principles set forth in AWPD-42. Only the strategic assumptions made by its authors had been changed with the passage of time. The Russian front no longer appeared in imminent danger of disintegrating,
and in a memo of 16 November for the JCS, General Arnold laid emphasis on Germany’s mounting embarrassment rather than on her growing strength. Two indecisive Russian campaigns, together with the Allied invasion of North Africa and aerial bombardment from the United Kingdom, had weakened the enemy. All of which pointed to the immediate need of intensifying to the utmost the pressure against Germany so that she might be allowed no time for recuperation. This end could only be achieved by increasing the weight of strategic bombardment.44
The “Plan for the Defeat of the Axis Powers,” drafted by AAF Headquarters on 1 December, again indorsed the soundness of current strategic commitments. Its authors insisted that Germany remained the principal enemy, that the only way to defeat her was by land invasion, that such an invasion could succeed only if preceded by strategic bombardment, and that the best if not the only opportunity for both air and land offensives lay in operations from the United Kingdom. Air operations should be aimed initially against the sources of German air and submarine strength, which constituted the chief immediate threats to Allied plans. When the German Air Force had been sufficiently reduced, the RAF would switch to day bombing in addition to its night operations. It was the optimistic hope of the authors that a combined bomber offensive, pressed to the fullest extent of Allied capabilities, would make an invasion of Germany feasible by the fall or winter of 1943.45
But further study by agencies of the Combined Chiefs of Staff served chiefly to reveal fundamental cleavages of opinion. On 30 December the subcommittee of the CPS to which the problem of post-TORCH operations had been returned in November reported to the CCS that it would be impossible to reconcile the divergent views until global strategy had been thoroughly reviewed.46 The report gave formal expression to a need which many had recognized for some time. In the absence of clear strategic policy it was especially hard to plan for an operation such as the bomber offensive from the United Kingdom, which had been projected according to a long-range plan and, while having no immediate minimum requirement, could absorb any conceivable increase in air units.47 And so it was that at the beginning of 1943 the hopes of the AAF for its program of strategic bombardment depended upon the outcome of the forthcoming conference of the Combined Chiefs of Staff with the two heads of state at Casablanca.
On 5 January, as has previously been noted,* General Spaatz was placed in command of the newly created Allied Air Force in North Africa. In addition to his duties in that connection he held responsibility under Eisenhower for coordinating air operations between the Eighth Air Force and the Allied Air Force and for allocating, when necessary, replacement aircraft and crews among the Eighth Air Force, the Twelfth Air Force, and the Eastern Air Command.48 The arrangement was weighted heavily in favor of the North African campaign. But it retained the principle of the complementary character of air operations in the two areas, Europe and North Africa. It did not, of course, attempt to provide for that over-all control of Allied air power for which General Arnold hoped, although, as he himself said, by unifying Allied effort in one area, at least it was a step in the right direction.49
By this time, in fact, events no longer pointed so imperatively toward a unified command for even the AAF units operating against the European Axis as had been the case during the earlier phases of TORCH. The drive for Tunisia had slowed down discouragingly, and the anticipated base areas for future strategic bombing of Axis objectives had not materialized. It no longer appeared likely that upon the successful completion of the North African campaign Eisenhower and Spaatz would be free to return to the United Kingdom for an invasion of western Europe in 1943.50 “Operations subsequent to TORCH” were being discussed, and, under British pressure, it seemed probable that something of the sort would be undertaken in preference to an early campaign in northern Europe. As for Arnold’s plan for a unified Allied air force, too many obstacles lay in its road. It required the prior existence of a supreme commander for all Allied forces operating against the European Axis and a roughly parallel organization and deployment of British and U.S. air forces, neither of which circumstances prevailed. The plan was apparently never presented to the CCS.51
The idea of the essential unity of air activity in the United Kingdom, North Africa, and the Middle East still flourished, especially in AAF Headquarters. It had been a useful concept in the fall of 1942; no doubt it had helped to keep the projected bomber offensive from being indefinitely postponed as a result of diversions to Africa and to the Pacific. It represented, too, a principle of command well suited to the extraordinary mobility of the air weapon. But it remained for the Casablanca conference to establish beyond dispute the right of the AAF to
* See above, p. 110.
demonstrate what it could accomplish by strategic bombardment from the United Kingdom.
Aircraft Production Priorities
For the AAF to implement its strategic doctrine, it was not enough to secure the necessary decisions concerning grand strategy. It was also a question of securing the means with which to operate. In a sense, of course, the problem of obtaining the aircraft required for the air offensive against Germany was really a part of the broader strategic problem. AAF requirements for defensive and supporting actions in all minor theaters could be established with relative ease. Requirements for the bomber offensive, on the other hand, stood or fell according to whether the project had or had not an unassailable place in Allied strategy. Regardless of strategic decisions, however, it remained a difficult task to assign priorities so as to make possible a large-scale air war in Europe without prejudicing other essential programs.
It had been early recognized that to carry out such an offensive as an effective action preliminary to invasion would require a large force of bombers and fighters. The requirements of the bomber offensive thus became the critical item in the aircraft production program which, when it had taken account of the minimum needs of other theaters and of training projects, had reached a startling figure. The 1942 production goal had been set at approximately 60,000 planes, of which 45,000 were to be of combat type. Of these 60,000 aircraft, 39,274 fell under Army cognizance, 10,190 under that of the U.S. Navy, and the rest were to be produced for the Allies.52 By the fall of 1942 it was clear that the objective for 1943 would have to be much larger.53 In addition to the fact that strategic considerations, being now more immediate than before, could be more accurately assessed, production had lagged behind stated requirements. Indeed, production reached a rate of 4,000 planes per month only in November of 1942.54
The authors of AWPD-42, the plan drafted in response to the President’s request of 24 August for a statement of needs for “complete air ascendancy over the enemy,” faced a difficult task. Requirements
for air support in other theaters, being minimum and relatively easy to measure according to the nature of the land and sea action anticipated, needed little proof. But in the case of the bomber offensive it was necessary to demonstrate both the nature and scope of the projected operations in order to justify the size of force required; and as yet there
existed little data on which to proceed concerning precision bombing under combat conditions in the ETO. When the paper was begun, only the results of the first five missions flown by the Eighth Air Force were at hand. The job was finished in two weeks, which meant that at most the authors could have taken account of only the first ten heavy bomber operations flown from the United Kingdom by American planes. RAF and German experience provided useful supplementary information, but the task presented in the main an academic problem which the authors attacked with insight and realism.
Beginning with the confident premise that experience had “shown that it is perfectly feasible to conduct accurate, high level, daylight bombing under combat conditions, in the face of enemy antiaircraft and fighter opposition,” the paper presented a specific plan for American participation in a combined bomber offensive. In order to realize the objective of crippling German economy at its nerve centers, it was estimated that it would be necessary to destroy some 177 targets, distributed among seven target systems. Assuming that direct hits with high-explosive bombs would do the job and that an average circular error of 1,000 feet from an altitude of 20,000 feet might be expected, the authors estimated the necessary bomb tonnage, and from that calculated the number of sorties required. The two-fold assumption that under European conditions five or six operations per month could be performed and that on the basis of British experience an average attrition rate of 20 per cent per month might be anticipated served then to fix a total requirement of 2,965 heavy bombers. If this full force could be made operational in the theater by 1 January 1944, the projected invasion of western Europe should be attempted in the late spring of that year. To be more specific, it was estimated that one-third of the preliminary task of strategic bombardment could be accomplished by the close of 1943 and that thereafter only four months of operations by the entire force would be required.
When to requirements for the bomber offensive against Germany there were added the minimum needs of air forces in other theaters, the result was an estimated 281 groups, or 63,068 combat aircraft, needed for all AAF operations up to, but not including, the combined assault on the continent of Europe. Of the 281 groups, approximately 78 would be necessary for operations from the United Kingdom. The addition of aircraft required for training and other noncombat purposes brought the total of AAF requirements for 1943 to 83,700
planes.55 The Navy apparently had estimated its requirements to be in the neighborhood of 26,300 aircraft, a figure which included 1,250 Army-type land-based bombers of the long-range category. For these bombers the authors of AWPD-42 substituted in their calculation 8,000 trainers, thereby bringing all land-based long-range bombers under AAF cognizance, and entered the commitments to other United Nations at 22,440 planes. Thus, according to AWPD-42, the grand total of aircraft required from U.S. production for 1943 became 139,190.56
Subsequent events altered the basis for calculation only slightly. When, on 1 December 1942, the operational and strategic considerations affecting aircraft requirements again were reviewed, the general outlook seemed more optimistic. It was then claimed (without too accurate statistical evidence)* that the Germans were losing 6 fighters for 1 U.S. bomber destroyed, instead of the conservative ratio of 2 to 1 tentatively suggested in AWPD-42. The date for the invasion of Europe was now advanced from the spring or summer of 1944 to the end of 1943, but estimates regarding aircraft requirements remained unaffected.57
AWPD-42 met stiff opposition from the outset. It was evident that an aircraft program of such magnitude would compete seriously with the Navy’s shipbuilding program, and it was to be expected that the Navy would object to the allocation of all land-based heavy bombers to the AAF. Without stressing this latter point, Admiral King on 24 September rejected the plan in its entirety.58 It was also clear that the aircraft program would compete with the Army ground program, especially in such heavy equipment as tanks, antiaircraft guns, and armored cars. Nevertheless, the AAF estimates received the approval of the War Department General Staff.59 By 15 October (it is not apparent exactly at what earlier date) the President also had accepted them in substance and had included a slightly reduced figure of 131,000 planes as the principal item in a “must” program of war production for 1943.60
To this point, estimates had been based largely on strategic considerations. Now it became necessary to review the aircraft production program in the light of available resources. Productive capacity and the logistical factors depending on it placed a strict limit on the extent to which any strategic plan could be put into effect, and the aircraft program was no exception. Donald M. Nelson, chairman of the War
* See above, pp. 221–24.
Production Board, had already called to the attention of Secretaries Stimson and Knox the fact that the production objectives for 1943 were considerably out of line with the productive capacity of the country. This point of view he presented to the JCS on 15 October 1942. Against U.S. capacity for producing munitions, facilities, and war construction during 1943, set in terms of dollars at roughly 75 billions, he placed the total military requirements for that year, which amounted to 92.9 billions. A substantial part of this military program had, however, been set by the President as an essential objective. The President’s “must” items, comprising the aircraft program of 131,000 planes (37 billions), the merchant-ship building program (3.6 billions), the program for building minor combat vessels of the antisubmarine type (4 billions), production in fulfillment of the U.S.S.R. protocol (2.6 billions), and materials plants (1.5 billions), constituted over half of the total planned production. Consequently, while other items would almost certainly be delayed until 1944 for completion under such circumstances, the “must” objectives might also be unattainable unless revised.61
The JCS therefore agreed to propose a general reduction in 1943 requirements. The aircraft program, being by far the largest single item, became the crux of the entire discussion. General Marshall on 20 October expressed his concern that a decision regarding aircraft should be obtained immediately from the President. He pointed out that each day of delay would result in an appreciable loss of plane production. Accordingly he proposed that the 1943 aircraft program be reduced from 131,000 to 107,000 planes, of which 82,000 would be of combat type. He also was prepared to make even more significant reductions in such Army ground equipment as tanks, antiaircraft guns, and armored cars. Admiral King was advised that Marshall’s proposal would not interfere with the proposed naval building program in any way.62
Acting on the advice of his chiefs of staff, President Roosevelt on 29 October instructed Nelson that the 107,000-plane objective “will be given highest priority and whatever preference is needed to insure its accomplishment.” He indicated that the “Army, the Navy and other governmental agencies are to cooperate to the fullest in the furtherance of this program,” adding that it was “really essential that in one way or another this program be carried out in total.”63
On the face of it, this directive would seem to have settled both the issue of air requirements and that of priority and preferential treatment
in production. It did settle the question of requirements to all intents and purposes. The revised 1943 military program, as approved by the JCS on 26 November 1942, reduced the total dollar value from 92.9 billions to 80.15 billions – which was believed to be an objective within the productive capacity of the nation. In this revised estimate, provision was made for 108,792 aircraft, representing a reduction of 3.73 billions from the figure originally quoted. Although other items of the President’s “must” list did not suffer appreciable reduction and the Maritime program was actually increased by 25 per cent, those programs not underlined by the Chief Executive were drastically cut. This was especially true of the Army ground program and that part of the Navy building program not specifically given preference by the President.64
But the battle for priority, the competition for preferential treatment in allocation of critical materials, had only begun. AWPD-42 had warned that the aircraft production objective for 1943, upon which the success particularly of the bomber offensive depended, could be met only if it were given priority over all other programs. That recommendation had been made in the light of 1942 experience. Since early in that year, aircraft production had been assigned to Priority AA-I, but it had been forced always to share that category with substantial parts of the other major war programs.65 Plane production had consequently been disappointing.66 To avoid a similar result in 1943, it was necessary to arrange a priority system which would be more selective than any then in force. Above all, first priority must not be overloaded to an extent which would make the accomplishment of any top priority item a doubtful, perhaps an impossible, task.67
General Arnold therefore set out, as a matter of the utmost urgency, to secure a frankly overriding priority for aircraft production.68 In that effort he received the hearty support of Lt. Gen. Brehon B. Somervell, who, as commanding general of the Services of Supply, was in a unique position to give practical counsel.69 The Army planners as a body favored a revision of existing priorities which would place the aircraft program alone in the top bracket. They pointed out that a directive along such lines would not necessarily establish a fixed priority but would simply indicate where the primary emphasis should be placed. They appreciated the fact that certain other programs, listed by the President as “must” items for 1943, would be essential to the success of the air war as well as to that of the war in general. The authors of AWPD-42 had foreseen that vast quantities of shipping would be
needed to transport the air forces and to supply them. And, with German submarines undertaking a major strategic offensive operation in the Atlantic, it was evident that as large a force of escort and antisubmarine vessels as possible would have to be employed to insure the safe passage of personnel, equipment, and supplies. The priority proposed by the Army, in other words, was intended to build a balanced production program around aircraft as the most critical single item.70
The Navy flatly disagreed.71 It had contemplated the aircraft program as outlined in AWPD-42 with unconcealed disfavor and had accepted the revised estimate apparently as the lesser of the proposed evils. According to Admiral King, he had given his approval only on the assurance that aircraft would not interfere with the Navy and Maritime projects which he believed essential to a balanced program of production.72 So the Navy submitted a counterproposal which placed in first priority not only aircraft but all aircraft carriers, auxiliary carriers, and cruisers then scheduled for completion in 1943 and the first quarter of 1944, submarines due to be completed prior to 31 December 1943, such landing craft as must be completed to clear the building facilities for escort vessels, and finally the maximum number of tankers and escort vessels – in short, a major portion of the Navy and Maritime programs.73 Navy spokesmen urged that these items, especially aircraft carriers and escort vessels, were not only necessary to supply the overseas air forces (as the AAF was perfectly ready to admit) but were actually of greater importance to the war effort than the grand total of aircraft.74
Be that as it may, the Navy’s counterproposal would have had the effect of once more overloading first priority. General Arnold agreed to place critical items in the air, ground, naval and maritime programs in a parallel position under an AA-I category on the advice of production experts who claimed that there would be no consequent interference with the production of the required aircraft for 1943. It soon developed, however, that such an arrangement would not only interfere with aircraft production but would make the 1943 air objective, on which the President had insisted, impossible to attain.75 Rather than accord the necessary preferential treatment to aircraft, Admiral King advocated that the President be asked to withdraw his “must” program, and that he be guided entirely by priorities established by the JCS.76 A compromise of sorts was reached on 26 November 1942 by which the President approved a No. 1 Group of critical items, including the
107,000-aircraft program, Army munitions requirements for the following six months, and substantial portions of the Navy and Maritime shipbuilding program. Although differing only slightly from the priority list against which General Arnold had registered his objection, the No. 1 Group received his approval. It is probable that by indorsing this paper, Arnold hoped on the one hand to avoid the delay and misunderstanding of protracted debate and on the other to secure a directive which, if not strictly satisfactory, was nevertheless broad and flexible and which would therefore permit a good deal of informal adjustment in putting it into effect.77
Nelson was asked at the same time to state whether or not this No. 1 Group could be accomplished. In his reply, dated 3 December 1942, he pointed out certain factors which seriously complicated the problem of producing all essential equipment on schedule. On the face of it, he wrote, it would seem quite feasible to produce in 1943 the No. 1 Group, estimated at 50 billions of dollars, for the total productive capacity of the nation amounted to more than 75 billions. But the limiting factor was not over-all productive capacity but certain critical machine tools and component parts. In addition, high priority had been accorded to such other projects as synthetic rubber, high-octane gasoline, and aluminum and alloy steel, all of which were in varying degrees required for the completion of the No. 1 Group items. It would be possible, he concluded, to produce the required aircraft by juggling the production of machine tools, but it would not be possible to complete all the No. 1 Group in 1943; nor could the aircraft program be completed if placed on a preferential basis equal to that of several other large segments of the 1943 war production.78
Thus the prospect for 1943 plane production continued to look uncertain. Many programs – the No. 1 Group, the rubber, high-octane gasoline, aluminum and alloy steel program, the Russian protocol and other export programs, and finally civilian supply and maintenance – all had a legitimate claim to the highest priority, and all had been given a “must” rating at one time or another by the government. It was, by the end of the year, evident that all could be accomplished concurrently in 1943, but not all completed on schedule. It was further clear that some could be completed on schedule if given preferential treatment over all others. Both General Somervell and Vice Adm. F. J. Horne, who had been engaged in surveying the problem, advised that aircraft could be given preference with less detriment to the rest of the
critical programs than if preference were given to any other single item. On the other hand, it appeared that the synthetic rubber and high octane gasoline projects could only be accomplished at crippling expense to the rest.79
Lack of overriding priorities, especially in the use of critical materials, continued through the following months to handicap the aircraft production program. During January and February 1943, that program was reported to be 17 per cent behind schedule. And it was apparent that the 1943 objective would probably not be fully attained.80 But the situation was not actually so serious as the welter of conflicting programs and priorities would seem on paper to make it. During the latter part of 1942 and early 1943, while the JCS were engaged in the futile and not very logical effort to establish which of a number of essential projects was most essential and to decide which of the President’s “must” programs could in fact be accomplished, production was proceeding with no clear priority directive at all, except that aircraft were being given as far as possible an overriding priority in accordance with the President’s directive of 29 October. In view of the favorable attitude taken toward the aircraft program by Nelson and the War Production Board, the AAF was willing to accept an informal preference in lieu of anything more satisfactory legally and to refrain prudently from raising the issue unnecessarily. By late April 1943, Robert A. Lovett, Assistant Secretary of War for Air, would be able to report in a letter to Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris that production was “coming along in grand shape.”81
The Case for Bombardment
The burden of proof in any discussion involving air strategy or aircraft production rested on the exponents of air power. This was particularly true of the American air strategists, who depended upon a yet largely untried tactical doctrine and who faced, in the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, a divided opinion regarding basic strategy and therefore regarding the best use to be made of U.S. air power. That does not mean that the AAF was standing alone. The air program had been evolved in close cooperation with General Marshall and his planning staff and in principle enjoyed their steady support.
In the final analysis there was one way, and one way only, to present convincingly the case for air, and that was by direct reference to experience. But, for the time being, operations could not be expected to
speak entirely for themselves; and considering the restricted scale of current operations by the Eighth Air Force, it was necessary to present the case for AAF daylight bombing to the best possible advantage not only to U.S. war agencies but to the British as well. Headquarters, AAF, fully appreciated the critical character of the experiment being carried on by the Eighth Air Force, and its commanders shared this awareness. General Eaker referred feelingly to the missionary work being done by what he later called his “piddling little force of Fortresses.” It might, he said, “affect the whole future of day bombardment in this war.”82 Accordingly, pertinent information on every mission that could be interpreted without falsification of fact as an air victory, or as a demonstration of the AAF doctrine of strategic bombardment, was at once relayed to Washington and there seized upon eagerly.
The initial operations of the VIII Bomber Command in August had come at an extremely opportune moment. American ideas of bombing and the American bombers themselves were being subjected to an increasing amount of skeptical attention. General Arnold was about to begin his fight in the JCS to prevent the diversion of air units to the Pacific, and AAF planners were in the process of estimating the air requirements for 1943 preparatory to issuing AWPD-42. On each account the VIII Bomber Command provided evidence of the utmost significance. The Lille attack of 9 October proved similarly useful. No sooner had the news reached Washington than a memo was prepared in AAF Headquarters for Harry Hopkins in which it was argued that the Lille mission “provides further proof of the soundness of the basic concept of AWPD-42, i.e., the effectiveness of properly exercised air power in destroying the ability of our enemy to wage war, and emphasizes the importance of maintaining to the full extent possible the vital air offensive against Germany.”83 This memo was forwarded to the White House in advance of the President’s action that same month in favor of an overriding priority for the production of aircraft according to a program built solidly around the heavy bomber and in the spirit of AWPD-42.
It was not enough simply to welcome the dispatches which as a matter of routine brought useful news to headquarters. It was necessary to see that information flowed copiously and in the most useful form from the theater to Washington. In November, General Arnold sent to General Eaker an officer especially qualified for the task of “writing up and
presenting to the American people the true potentialities of air power which are factually supported by operations in your theater.” “We must,” Arnold wrote, “fully inform this country of the success that we have had with them [the heavy bombers] to date and point out forcibly that through their use from Europe in ever increasing numbers we can crush Germany’s capacity to wage war at its source.”84
It soon became apparent that some agency in AAF Headquarters should be made specifically responsible for digesting data regarding bombardment and preparing it suitably for presentation to the President, the JCS and CCS, the Office of Chief of Naval Operations, and interested members of Congress. On 25 November, the Directorate of Bombardment was ordered to establish the required agency, and certain specifications were laid down for its operation: “Data must be factual. Any resemblance to propaganda will defeat our purpose. The presentation must be such as will stir the imagination of the listener. It is necessary, therefore, that the data be prepared by persons with imagination, who have been trained in selling new ideas.”85
In presenting the case for bombardment, which of course meant at this juncture the strategic bombing of Germany, the AAF received powerful support from the British, whose opinion, by virtue of their long experience both in receiving and delivering bombs, carried much weight. A paper prepared by Trenchard, Marshal of the RAF, arguing that air power must be applied independently in strategic bombing and not entangled with land campaigns undertaken in accordance with outmoded military doctrines, was widely circulated in the War Department and apparently had a good deal of influence on American strategic thinking.86 On 13 October 1942, Air Cdre. S. C. Strafford wrote to Brig. Gen. O. A. Anderson, AC/AS, Plans, regarding the problem of preserving for the heavy bomber “its proper and vital place in the new air program,” and enclosed certain documents embodying British doctrine on the subject which he hoped would be of some use in that direction.87 Somewhat later, in November, Air Vice Marshal John C. Slessor brought a memo prepared by the British chiefs of staff to the United States for discussion with the JCS. This document, reflecting much of Lord Trenchard’s ideas on air power and urging the creation of a great Anglo-American force of 4,000 to 6,000 bombers by April 1944 as a matter of the highest priority compatible with other essential projects, made a most favorable impression on Lovett. It was forwarded to Secretary Stimson on 15 November after having been
withdrawn from the CS agenda because of Admiral King’s protest that, since it had not been approved by the British Imperial War Council, it could not be considered official.88
The AAF also drew independently on British experience. On 1 November 1941, General Arnold had sent a board of AAF experts to England to study the effectiveness of German bombing, and it was their impression, supported by British opinion, that, had the enemy practiced systematic strategic bombardment as the British and American air strategists understood it and had they concentrated at an earlier date on vital objectives and followed up their attacks to a decisive conclusion, the results would have been fatal to the British war effort. Attention was further called in the fall of 1942 to the devastating effect of RAF area bombing. The 1,000-plane raid on Cologne of 30/31 May was believed, for example, to have destroyed approximately 12 per cent of the city’s main industrial and residential areas.89
However, certain difficulties arose. The AAF was ready enough to cite the effectiveness of British area bombing when it was a question of demonstrating the place of a combined bomber offensive in the total strategic picture. The British effort had from the beginning been taken for granted as an essential part of a 24-hour-a-day bombing program calculated to bring continuous pressure to bear on the enemy. But there was the initial problem of demonstrating that the American bombing force was capable of supplying the daylight raids which were to constitute the other half of the combined offensive. It was, in other words, often easier to present the case for strategic bombardment in general than that of daylight precision bombing to which the AAF was committed more as a matter of faith than of knowledge empirically arrived at. The British had been carrying on a manifestly effective campaign of area bombardment according to more or less thoroughly demonstrated principles, and there was always a presumption in the minds of disinterested observers in favor of the American bombing force contributing to this established campaign rather than pioneering in unproved methods. More than that, precision bombing had been specifically and sharply questioned in the late summer of 1942 by the British press and by the U.S. Navy. Consequently a good deal of special pleading was done in behalf of precision techniques, and comparisons were sometimes drawn to the disadvantage of the British doctrine.
For example, when the news of the first bombing mission of the Eighth Air Force arrived in Washington, the chief of Air Staff ordered
a memo prepared for General Arnold’s signature to General Marshall, for the attention of Admirals King and Leahy. The attack on Rouen, the resulting paper declared, “again verifies the soundness of our policy of the precision bombing of strategic objectives rather than mass (blitz) bombing of large, city size areas. The Army Air Forces early recognized that the effective use of air power on a worldwide basis [underscoring in original] required the ability to hit small targets from high altitudes. “It was not a doctrine, the memo continued, adopted capriciously. The war experience of all nations had been carefully studied, the difficulties in accomplishing precision bombing had been determined, and U.S. training, materiel, and tactics had been modified accordingly.90
This and similar statements were meant strictly for home consumption. Likewise for staff use only were a series of special studies, dated 19 October, prepared under the director of intelligence service at Headquarters, AAF, which undertook to analyze the British area bombing at Rostock, Cologne, and Osnabruck. The general conclusion reached was that bombing of this sort, while effective enough in producing general damage, was an unreliable and costly way of paralyzing the enemy’s war machine and that, in comparison, precision bombing of a specific phase of the enemy’s war economy according to a definite but flexible strategic plan afforded the most economical means of effecting a decisive concentration of bombardment effort.91
Apparently through no fault of the Air Staff, these studies finally reached the RAF with results described by General Eaker on 6 December as “most unfortunate.” Eaker, in fact, considered them an unfair statement of the British effort, based as they were on inadequate information.92 Although constantly interested in presenting a favorable case for precision methods, AAF Headquarters and American air commander; in the ETO were alike worried over the tendency of American observers, both civilian and military, to depreciate the British effort. They clearly understood that good Anglo-American relations were essential to the combined bombardment program, as well as to any other combined enterprise.93
At the same time, one of the most difficult tasks they faced was to sell daylight precision bombing to the British. British opinion had originally been deeply skeptical of the American doctrine, and, although British official sanction was given tentatively to the day bombardment program and the operational record of the Eighth Air Force had been
a revelation to most observers in England, opinion in the United Kingdom remained throughout the rest of 1942 in some doubt regarding the relative effectiveness of the American bombing. Indeed, when the daylight operations of the Eighth Air Force during the fall became seriously handicapped by the weather and when improved German fighter tactics and antiaircraft fire took increasing toll of the U.S. bombers, the question was asked with increasing insistence whether the VIII Bomber Command should not resort to area bombing by night and give up the vexing attempt to bomb pinpoint targets.94
This was but one of several fundamental questions pertaining to the bomber offensive confronted by the Casablanca conference when it met in the middle of January 1943. It had to define the place of that offensive in basic strategic plans, it had to clarify the mission of the bombing force, especially that of the Eighth Air Force, and it had to establish a formal system of control for the combined bombing operation.
The strategic decisions made at Casablanca reaffirmed the plans on the basis of which a combined bomber offensive had originally been conceived. First priority was given unequivocally to the war against the European Axis. To defeat Germany, it would be necessary to invade the continent of Europe in force. But Europe had still to be considered as a fortress which must be subjected to vigorous bombardment before the final assault would be practicable. Hence the combined bomber offensive remained a prerequisite to any major land operation against Germany.95
The planned invasion of the continent was postponed in favor of further amphibious and land operations in the Mediterranean area.* Specifically, it was decided to take Sicily (Operation HUSKY) as a means of securing the Mediterranean lines of communication, of diverting German pressure from the Russian front, and of intensifying pressure on Italy.96 Tentative agreement on this strategy was reached only after much debate. The U.S. JCS had consistently opposed Mediterranean “operations subsequent to TORCH” as merely another step in an indecisive and costly encircling action, and had demanded that Allied forces, both air and surface, be concentrated for a decisive push in western Europe against the heart of Germany. The British chiefs of staff, on the contrary, while insisting on the maximum application of Allied strategic air power against Germany proper, preferred to postpone
* See above, pp. 113–14.
cross-Channel operations in favor of an offensive in the Mediterranean in the hope of seriously dispersing German strength. Certain logistical factors favored the British policy. Chief of these was the fact that the Allies already had large forces in North Africa ready for further operations in the Mediterranean once TORCH had been completed, and it would greatly ease the critical shipping problem if those forces could be utilized without having to be transported to the United Kingdom. The American delegation appreciated this economy of tonnage and admitted the additional advantages offered by a successful HUSKY.97
The AAF had consistently supported the views advanced by the American Joint Chiefs at Casablanca. Yet, in a very real sense the decision in favor of HUSKY, by allowing more time for the systematic application of strategic air power, enhanced the position of the bomber offensive as an independent operation. It would be possible, as the British pointed out, to concentrate a larger force of heavy bombers in the United Kingdom than if an early invasion of the continent were contemplated.98 There would be less immediate need for the build-up of ground support forces, a build-up that could have been accomplished on the scale required for a continental invasion only at some expense of heavy bombardment. It should be noted too that the decision to postpone the invasion placed it at a time more nearly corresponding to the schedule set in AWPD-42. If there was general disappointment among the Americans over the decision in favor of the Mediterranean strategy, there was for the AAF cause for gratification in the simultaneous decision to mount the “heaviest possible bomber offensive against the German war effort.”*
There was more at stake for the AAF, however, than questions of strategy. Doubt continued to exist regarding the capabilities and tactics of the American bombing force, and, apparently under the leadership of the Prime Minister, pressure was brought to bear to have the heavy bombers of the Eighth Air Force join the RAF in its night bombing campaign. General Arnold, facing the necessity of presenting the case for daylight bombardment in some detail, summoned General Eaker, whose experiences gave him special qualifications, to defend the U.S. doctrine.99
Eaker began his defense of the American tactics by maintaining that only one convincing argument had ever been advanced for night
* See again, pp. 209–211, 177–78.
bombing over day bombing and that was that it was safer. But in point of fact the Eighth Air Force rate of loss in day raids had been lower than that of the RAF on its night operations, a fact that was explained in part by the great improvement in German night fighter tactics and in part by the heavy firepower of the American bombers. If the day bombers were made to operate by night their losses, as a result of both enemy action and operational hazards, would increase materially, for they were neither equipped nor trained for that sort of work. To equip and train them would cause untold delay. Of even greater importance was the fact that day bombing, regardless of the question of safety, could do things that night bombing could not. The day bombers could hit small, important targets such as individual factories which could not be found, seen, or hit at night. Their accuracy in such attacks Eaker estimated at about five times that of the best night bombing, thanks to the excellent bombsight they carried. Hence day bombing tended to be more economical than night bombing, for a force only one-fifth as large would be required to destroy a given installation. Eaker of course admitted that the objective of night bombardment was not primarily the destruction of individual targets but the devastation of vital areas, and as such it could not properly be compared to precision bombing on the ground of accuracy. But that introduced another point of the greatest significance: day bombing and night bombing were ideally calculated to supplement each other. By employing both it would be possible to bring continuous, 24-hour pressure to bear on the enemy, thus preventing his defenses from relaxing. It would also be possible, in many cases, for the AAF to locate difficult targets and mark them by the fires resulting from their preliminary bombing, and so make it feasible for the RAF to complete the job at night. Furthermore, the day bombing program reduced airdrome, air space, and communications congestion in the United Kingdom, where space was at a premium. Finally, day bombing would permit the destruction of German day fighters. It was, Eaker felt, the most economical method of reducing German air strength because the enemy would have to send up his fighter planes to protect vital objectives even when he would not commit them to battle with Allied fighter forces.
Eaker’s presentation of the case for daylight bombardment was followed by many questions. Why had there been so many abortive sorties? Why had there been so few missions? Why should the U.S. bombers and those of the RAF not be given the same directive and the
same targets? Why had U.S. bombers not bombed Germany? In answer, he described the factors that hitherto had limited the activity of his bombers: the relative inexperience of the crews; the requirements of TORCH which had seriously bled the Eighth Air Force and which had diverted the efforts of much of the force remaining, especially of the service units; the weather during the fall and winter months which had both limited the number of missions and increased the incidence of abortive sorties; the current strategic directive which, by limiting the bombers to submarine bases and related targets in the occupied countries, reduced the choice of operating areas, thereby intensifying the weather problem; the lack of long-range fighters for escort into Germany. All of these difficulties could, he claimed, soon be mitigated. Crew experience would automatically increase, TORCH should soon require less of Eighth Air Force strength and time, strenuous efforts were being made to develop blind-bombing tactics to circumvent bad weather, long-range escort appeared in sight, and by enlarging the scope of Eighth Air Force bombing operations to include targets in Germany proper, the CCS could do much to relieve the American force from a strategic policy which, however necessary, had proved embarrassing both operationally and politically.100
On this latter point, General Eaker went on to say that so far from avoiding German targets he believed they should in the near future be given a high priority for day bombardment. Missions to Germany, by scattering enemy defenses and augmenting the present RAF effort, would contribute strategically to the success of the air war. They would also contribute to the improvement of Eighth Air Force morale and at the same time would undermine that of the German civilian population. He would, he claimed, be ready by 1 February with a force of 100 heavy bombers and 100 fighters to carry the day bombing campaign to the enemy homeland. If TORCH no longer needed the entire strength of the Eighth Air Force in its support, then it was time another directive were issued more in line with the strategic situation in northwestern Europe. Eaker insisted that, since TORCH possessed its own adequate air force, target directives should be issued either by the chief of Air Staff, RAF, or by the CCS, rather than by the supreme commander of Operation TORCH.101
The chief testimony to the effectiveness of the above arguments lies in the fact that the day bombardment program was subjected to no further question. But its future also depended to a considerable extent
on the system of command under which the day bombers were placed. Eaker tacitly recognized that fact when he advocated placing operational control-meaning the determination of over-all target priority only – in the hands either of the chief of Air Staff, RAF, or of the CCS themselves. He appears to have been especially anxious to avoid complete integration of command over the American and British bomber forces such as had been accomplished for the TORCH air forces by Eisenhower. In that event the commander in chief of RAF Bomber Command would naturally be placed in charge of the combined force, and Eaker had reason to believe that Air Marshal Harris would probably favor transferring the American bombers from day to night operations.102
To insure for the American commander full control over the methods employed by his force thus came to be the keynote of U.S. policy as far as the bomber offensive was concerned. General Marshall, speaking for the U.S. Joint Chiefs suggested that the American bombers in England should be under the operational direction of the British, who would prescribe the targets and the timing of attacks; but he insisted that operational procedure and technique for the American force should remain the prerogative of American commanders. General priorities should be prescribed by the CCS. British command, he felt, was logical until such time as the U.S. air forces outnumbered the British and until they had demonstrated beyond any shadow of doubt the efficacy of their daylight bombing methods, at which time a reexamination of command arrangements would be in order. This point of view was accepted by the British without apparent opposition.103
When it came to deciding the main objectives for the combined offensive, two considerations stood out in bold relief: the submarine remained the principal threat to Allied operations in the west, and the German Air Force would have to be defeated before Germany could be successfully invaded or even subjected to decisively effective strategic bombardment. The gravity of the submarine problem needed no new proof. The figures on shipping losses incurred in the course of this transoceanic war sufficed to make defeat of the unquestionably a “first charge on the resources of the United Nations.” And it was agreed that intensified bombing of submarine operating bases and construction yards should be carried out by the combined bomber force, with immediate attention being devoted to the Biscay bases.104
As for the Luftwaffe, it was currently believed to be in a critical state. The stamina of its crews was reputed to be decreasing, its training
indifferent, and its morale low. There was supposed no longer to be any depth of reserves behind the first line of fighter defenses. Consequently decisive action should be taken at once to reduce the GAF before it had a chance to recuperate. It was recognized that German air power could in effect be reduced by dispersion, in which case the American daylight bombers could probably be used more profitably to harass the GAF from bases in North Africa than to conduct strategic bombing operations from the United Kingdom; and in the early days of the Casablanca conference it was still an open question whether the American force might not better be deployed in that direction. But the GAF could also be reduced, and ultimately more effectively, by destroying German aircraft production and base facilities and by forcing the enemy fighters to engage in a war of attrition with heavily armed formations of day bombers. For these operations the United Kingdom provided the only suitable base available. It was therefore decided to concentrate in the United Kingdom both the British and the American bombing forces.105
In a sense, of course, s and aircraft constituted objectives of intermediate rather than of final importance. The final objective remained the enemy’s total war potential. American airmen were still confidently of the opinion that, by precision attacks on “bottleneck” industries, German production could be paralyzed. British bombardment experts on the other hand continued to emphasize enemy morale.106
On 21 January 1943, the CCS issued CCS 166/1/D, usually referred to as the Casablanca Directive, for the bomber offensive from the United Kingdom. The ultimate objective of that offensive was stated to be “the progressive destruction and dislocation of the German military, industrial and economic system, and the undermining of the morale of the German people to a point where their capacity for armed resistance is fatally weakened.” The primary objectives for the time being were listed in the following order of priority: (1) German submarine construction yards, (2) the German aircraft industry, (3) transportation, (4) oil plants, and (5) other targets in enemy war industry.
In addition to these priority objectives, which were subject to alteration from time to time as the strategic situation developed, other targets were mentioned as “of great importance either from the political or military” point of view. First of the examples mentioned in this connection were the submarine bases on the Biscay coast which the Eighth
Air Force had been attacking sporadically for the past three months. The CCS had decided not to include them in the order of priority because that list was meant to cover long-term operations only. The bases were moreover not situated in Germany, and since the American force in the past had been severely, if unjustly, criticized before British public opinion for devoting so large a portion of its effort to objectives outside Germany proper, it had been considered wise to treat the Biscay bases in a special category.107 Nevertheless, the CCS made it perfectly clear that those bases were still targets of the highest strategic value. And, if it were found that the maximum pressure applied to them for an appreciable time produced decisive results, the attacks should continue whenever conditions were favorable and for as long and as often as necessary. Provision was also made for bombing such essentially political objectives as Berlin, for attacking, when the time came, targets in northern Italy in connection with amphibious operations in the Mediterranean theater, and for action against any unforeseen but important objectives. When the Allied armies re-entered the European continent, the combined bomber force would afford them all possible support in the manner most effective.
The directive gave a specific place to the day bomber force which, it stated, should “take every opportunity to attack Germany by day, to destroy objectives that are unsuitable for night attack, to sustain continuous pressure on German morale, to impose heavy losses on the German day fighter force and to contain German fighter strength away from the Russian and Mediterranean theatres of war.” In another provision affecting primarily the American force, it specified that in attacking objectives in occupied countries the attacking force would conform to “such instructions as may be issued from time to time for political reasons by His Majesty’s Government through the British Chiefs of Staff.” This provision was meant to answer a peculiar problem. Political considerations, it had been argued, often superseded military expediency in the case of objectives in occupied countries. The British government or representatives from one of the exiled governments sometimes placed a political embargo on certain otherwise excellent military targets. In such cases decisions had often to be taken very quickly, and it would not be practicable to deal with the matter through the CCS in Washington.108
Oddly enough, the Casablanca directive made no mention of the system of command under which the combined offensive was to be conducted. Except that it was issued by the CCS “to the appropriate British
and United States Air Force Commanders, to govern the operation of the British and United States Bomber Commands in the United Kingdom,” it leaves the reader quite in the dark regarding the machinery of control. Very probably the omission was intentional, for CCS 166/1/D is primarily a strategic directive. But the lack of any specific paper on the subject of command seems to have caused some confusion. On 2 February 1943 the British Joint Staff Mission proposed to the U.S. Joint Chiefs that the chief of the British Air Staff should assume “forthwith” the responsibility for carrying out the combined bomber offensive as decided upon at Casablanca, and that his first act should be to issue to the commanding general of the Eighth Air Force “the agreed directive (CCS 166/1/D),”109 a suggestion which is somewhat surprising inasmuch as the paper in question was already addressed to “the appropriate British and United States Air Force Commanders.”
The secretary of the JCS replied by referring to the agreement reached in CCS 65th meeting, 21 January 1943, at Casablanca. On General Marshall’s motion it had then been agreed that control of bomber operations conducted by the U.S. air forces in the United Kingdom would be in the hands of the British as a “matter of command rather than agreement with the U.S. Commanders.” It would, however, “be the responsibility of the U.S. Commanders to decide the technique and method to be employed.” A message including this information was dispatched on 4 February to the commanding general of U.S. forces in the United Kingdom. Other than that, no directive appears to have been issued.110 Meanwhile, of course, the responsibility for the combined bombardment operation fell naturally upon the chief of the British Air Staff, Sir Charles Portal, and it was he, as agent of the CCS, who directed it for the rest of 1943.
The Casablanca conference did much to clear the strategic atmosphere, especially in regard to the use of air power. It was thereafter possible for Allied strategists to plan with new assurance and to think with new clarity. But the work of the conference was done on the level of general policy; although it laid down guiding principles, it did not entertain specific plans. Even the directive for the bomber offensive provided only a general indication of policy and its target priority list gave only tentative direction.111 It became the task of the succeeding months, culminating in the TRIDENT conference of May 1943, to translate the Casablanca decisions into terms of specific commitments and detailed objectives.