|
|
|
 Developments in Air Warfare Aviation had little effect on the outcome of the surface battles of World War I because it was still in its developmental infancy. In each major nation after the war, however, civilian and military leaders studied the ideas of such men as Britain's Sir Hugh Trenchard, America's William Mitchell, and Italy's Giulio Douhet. The nations that were to be the major air adversaries of World War II developed plans for organization and aerial equipment which reflected their national objectives and their basic concepts of war. The Royal Air Force (RAF) of Great Britain was formed on April 1, 1918, by the union of the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service. Although the British Navy later recovered control of its aviation units, Britain continued to accord aviation coordinate status with land and sea forces. In its rearmament programs after 1936 it felt compelled to emphasize the development of air defense forces to meet the challenge of Nazi Germany's Luftwaffe. Despite frequent demands for a unified air force, the United States continued to maintain separate Army and Navy air forces, but the organization of the Army Air Forces on June 20, 1941, and the establishment of air representation on the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff gave aviation a status practically coordinate with that of the older services. As a result of war experience, War Department Field Manual 100-20, Command and Employment of Air Power, which was issued on July 21, 1943, stated: "Land power and air power are coequal and interdependent forces; neither is an auxiliary of the other. United States Air Corps leaders were able to obtain the development of long-range heavy bombers because of the requirements of hemispheric defense, but they also gave attention to the procurement of aircraft designed to support ground forces. Although the Luftwaffe was established as an independent equal of the German Army and Navy in 1935, the Nazi high command viewed air forces as valuable chiefly for supporting blitzkrieg ground assault campaigns. The Luftwaffe was equipped chiefly with fast fighters, twin-engine bombers, and transport planes. The other Axis partner in Europe, Fascist Italy, in 1923 created a separate air force that professed to follow Douhet's teachings. Prewar feats of picked Italian aircrews and special airplanes enhanced Benito MUSSOLINI's reputation, but the Italian Air Force had almost no modern aircraft when it went to war in 1940. A few Italian air units later served with the Luftwaffe when Germany took over military operations in the Mediterranean area. When World War I ended, France possessed the world's largest and most virile air force, but its strength was eroded by mismanagement at high levels. During the 1930's, French economic mobilization policy did not support the country's foreign policy, and the General Staff chose to develop the Maginot Line and the navy at the expense of aircraft and tanks. France was probably superior to Germany in the caliber of its aircrews and in individual aircraft characteristics in 1939, but the Luftwaffe held an imposing quantitative superiority, which was increased by the dispersion of the French Air Force. In the air-ground battles of 1940 the French air arm inflicted heavy damage on German air and armored forces, but it was too small and was soon destroyed as a fighting force. Viewing aviation as a supporting force for surface operations, Japan maintained completely separate and seldom cooperative army and navy air forces. Even in the final months of the war, when the home islands were under air attack, the two air arms had separate aircraft warning systems, and each attempted to protect the targets which it judged to be most important. Except for the courage and patriotism of the fliers who gave their lives in futile Kamikaze attacks, Japan contributed little to the development of airpower experience during the war. The USSR's air forces were organized into a relatively unimportant naval air force and the Soviet Air Force, which both belonged to and was assigned to assist the Soviet Army. As a support force, the Soviet Air Force developed heavily armored fighters and medium bombers. In 1942, Joseph STALIN organized an independent air force, known as the Long-Distance Flying Command (ADD), but it did not receive equipment suited to its mission. By Anglo-American standards the ADD was a force of medium bombers and twin-engine transports. Strategic Bombardment In its essentials the concept of strategic bombardment was best stated in Douhet's writings. This concept visualized a defensive role for surface forces, an aerial offensive designed to secure command of the air, and the aerial destruction of an enemy's capacity to support surface forces and its will to continue the war. Douhet believed that command of the air would be established by attacks against enemy aviation facilities and not through aerial fighting. He therefore advocated development of a "battle plane capable both of defending itself in the air and of destroying hostile ground objectives. Although the Luftwaffe was not designed for strategic air warfare, Adolf HITLER elected to commit it to the Battle of Britain on Aug. 8, 1940. The Nazi plan was to gain air superiority by destroying the RAF Fighter Command and to employ the German bomber force to soften British coastal defenses, transportation facilities, and population centers in preparation for a combined sea and airborne invasion of southern and southeastern England. Aided by newly developed radar, the British fighter force proved superior to German bombers, which were inadequately armed and lacked the ability to carry heavy loads of bombs. A series of vacillating decisions by the Luftwaffe commander, Hermann Goering (Goring), also prevented the numerically superior German Air Force from achieving a decisive concentration of force against any single objective. By December 1940, the Luftwaffe had failed to accomplish its strategic mission and had suffered heavy losses. In its subsequent campaigns against the Soviet Union, it continued to lack long-range bombers and was powerless to prevent the Russians from rebuilding an air force at factories and bases beyond the Ural Mountains. According to the United States Strategic Bombing Survey, the first factor in the ultimate defeat of the German Air Force was that: "The German Air Force was originally designed for direct support of ground operations, and a lack of a long-range bomber force proved a grave strategic error. Because of the national emphasis on air defense, the RAF Bomber Command was weak at the beginning of the war and was unable to undertake strategic bombing before May 1940. The buildup of American Army Air Forces heavy bombers in Europe was delayed by conflicting requirements of the Allied land campaign in North Africa. Not until Jan. 21, 1943, could the Anglo-American Combined Chiefs of Staff order a combined bomber offensive designed to attain " 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. As implemented thereafter, the combined bomber offensive employed RAF bombers that flew at night chiefly against area targets and American bombers from Great Britain and Italy that made daylight precision-bombing attacks. Contrary to original expectations, American bombers required fighter escorts to prosecute sustained attacks against heavily defended targets, but early in 1944 a combination of attacks against aircraft facilities and of aerial battles established Allied air superiority over Germany. Many airpower proponents consider that World War II neither proved nor disproved the validity of strategic air doctrines, since the war was conducted as a series of interdependent air, ground, and naval campaigns. In any assessment of the results of the combined bomber offensive against Germany, it is certainly important to note that it was related to the Allied ground campaign, which began with the invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944. Of the 2,700,000 tons of bombs dropped against Germany, only 28 percent fell before July 1 of that year. Only after the successful Allied invasion were the heavy bombers free to attack strategic targets in Germany in full force. Utilizing its tremendous economic potential and displaying good ability to repair and disperse its factories, Germany actually increased its war production during the months of the Allied air attack. War requirements multiplied even more swiftly than production, however, with the result that beginning in December 1944 all sectors of German economic life were collapsing. " The German experience, stated the United States Strategic Bombing Survey, " suggests that even a first-class military power--rugged and resilient as Germany was--cannot live long under full-scale and free exploitation of air weapons over the heart of its territory. After a later and more exhaustive study, the British historians Sir Charles Kingsley Webster and Noble Frankland concluded in The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany, 1939-1945 (vol. 3, p. 310, London 1961): ". . . both cumulatively in largely indirect ways and eventually in a more intimate and direct manner, strategic bombing . . . made a contribution to victory which was decisive. In the war against Japan, carrier-based aircraft of the United States Pacific Fleet eventually joined the strategic air campaign, but the United States Twentieth Air Force contributed the vast preponderance of the strategic bombing effort against the Japanese home islands. With a limited economy crowded into a few industrial cities and without adequate air defenses, Japan was highly vulnerable to air assault. Nevertheless, strategic bombing had to await the deployment to combat of the new B-29 aircraft, which had a range long enough to reach Japan from available bases. Hurried into combat from airfields in western China, the Twentieth Air Force's 20th Bomber Command initiated strategic air attacks against Japan on June 15, 1944, but the distance was too great and logistical support too scarce for the B-29's when flying from China. Utilizing newly built bases in the Mariana Islands, B-29's of the 21st Bomber Command launched sustained air attacks against Japan on Nov. 24, 1944. During the period March 9-June 15, 1945, these planes flew at night to prosecute heavy incendiary attacks against six principal Japanese urban industrial concentrations. Effectively blockaded by American submarines and under heavy air attack, Japan's leaders were ready to sue for peace (though not unconditionally) in May 1945, well before the USSR's entry into the Pacific war and the employment of United States ATOMIC BOMBS against Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and August 9. "It seems clear, stated the United States Strategic Bombing Survey, "that air supremacy and its later exploitation over Japan proper was the major factor which determined the timing of Japan's surrender and obviated any need for invasion. Tactical Air Support for Ground Warfare Other nations had planned to employ aviation in support of their ground forces, but the techniques of the Luftwaffe in Poland, Norway, the Low Countries, and northern France during 1939 and 1940 established a model of effectiveness. Organized into air fleets (Luftflotten) and air corps (Fliegerkorps ), the Luftwaffe jealously guarded the integrity of its air units, but it made every effort to perform preplanned missions in support of the blitzkrieg. (Only reconnaissance was attached directly to ground units, and this branch of aviation was repossessed by the Luftwaffe in 1942.) Rarely remaining at one airfield more than a few days, the Fliegerkorps shifted the mass of their dive bombers and fighters to attack critical targets on any ground front. The stages of the air attacks included strikes against hostile aircraft and enemy airfields, the enemy's communications and main headquarters, and then the enemy's beaten and retreating troops. These corps performed very effectively on the narrow fronts characteristic of ground operations in western Europe. At the beginning of the campaign against the Soviet Union the German Air Force again achieved striking successes, but the distances soon proved too great and the force available too small. Moreover, the Soviet Air Force rebuilt its strength and countered German blows with telling effect. The Luftwaffe not only was overextended, but also was required to devote most of its efforts to the close support of German ground forces, with a consequent reduction in the effort that could be applied to counter air force and interdiction operations. In the early campaigns in Europe an RAF component was attached to the British Expeditionary Force, and individual squadrons were often attached to divisions and corps. In January 1943, the United States 12th Air Support Command in North Africa was similarly attached to the United States 2d Corps. Such arrangements negated the inherent flexibility of aviation, and centrally controlled Luftwaffe units easily overwhelmed divided Allied air squadrons. Recognizing that "penny packets of aviation were ineffective, Gen. (later Field Marshal) Sir Bernard Law MONTGOMERY (later 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein), commander of the British Eighth Army in North Africa, acknowledged Air Vice Marshal (later Air Marshal Sir) Arthur Coningham as his equal and permitted the Desert Air Force to be employed as a centrally controlled force. On July 21, 1943, the United States War Department officially accepted this coequality of ground and air forces and provided that the tasks of the new tactical air forces, which were designed to cooperate with ground armies, would be to gain air superiority, to prevent the movement of hostile troops and supplies, and to provide close air support to ground troops. This pattern of air employment was tested in Italy and elaborated in the all-out ground campaigns in Europe after June 1944. Even though the USSR continued to consider aviation as an auxiliary to ground armies, the actual employment of the Soviet Air Force was similar to that of the Americans and the British. As a rule, one air army served each front (army group) and operated according to the battle plan of the front commander. The Soviet Air Force recognized the tasks of air superiority, isolation of the battle area, and close support. Long-range missions of the ADD were usually coordinated with the requirements of the ground battle. In the jungle and island battles of the Pacific the broad outlines of tactical air force employment were not unlike those of Europe. Ground invasion troops in these theaters, however, generally lacked sufficient organic artillery, with the result that close air support of ground forces was of added importance. With a long tradition of ground support, which dated back to the Nicaraguan intervention of 1926-1933, United States Marine airmen developed (especially in the latter stages of the Pacific campaigns) communications, command, and employment techniques that enabled them to give excellent close air support to friendly ground troops. Airborne Assault and Air Transport For a nation that had extensive civil experience with air transport and had pioneered in the military application of airlift by ferrying Gen. Francisco Franco's Moroccan troops to Spain in 1936, Germany was strangely ambivalent in the field of transport aviation. The Luftwaffe never consolidated the management of transport under a single chief, and the standard Ju-52 transport fleet not only was used for airlift but provided a substantial proportion of the aircraft employed in Luftwaffe training programs. In operations that proceeded according to schedule, Luftwaffe air transport machinery worked well, as was demonstrated in the employment of air-dropped and air-landed troops in Norway and the Netherlands in 1940 and in the capture of Crete in the spring of 1941. By the winter of 1942-1943, however, German air transport forces were exhausted in a futile effort to resupply the besieged ground armies at Stalingrad (now Volgograd). At the outset of the war the Soviet Union probably intended to make extensive use of elite airborne troops, but these forces were soon destroyed in ground battles, and such transport aircraft as remained were usually employed in resupplying guerrilla forces. One of the chief missions of the ADD was to fly nocturnal supply drops to partisan troops in forward areas. The Anglo-American organization of airlift forces placed central control of most such units under a troop carrier headquarters, which could employ the transport planes either for airlift or for air assault operations. Allied airborne assaults accompanied invasions in North Africa in November 1942, in Sicily in July 1943, in Normandy in June 1944, in southern France in August 1944, in the Netherlands in September 1944, and across the Rhine River in March 1945. The First Allied Airborne Army, which commanded both airborne divisions and troop carrier wings, managed the two last-named operations. In the Pacific theater smaller regimental-sized air assault operations were conducted at Nadzab, New Guinea, in September 1943 and at Tagaytay Ridge and Corregidor in the Philippines in February 1945. Both aerial resupply and air assault operations were vitally important under jungle warfare conditions in the recapture of Burma, the most striking single operation being Operation Thursday, the fly-in of Maj. Gen. Orde C. Wingate's Special Force into central Burma in March-April 1944. When not employed in air assault operations, British and American troop carrier forces in all theaters hauled high priority supplies to forward airfields and evacuated sick and wounded men to rear-area hospitals on their return trips. In each Anglo-American theater of war the allocation of cargo space was managed by some form of central air transport control agency, which set priorities in terms of the immediate requirements of the theater commander's mission. Global air transport developments were almost entirely American. The Army's Air Transport Command reached from the United States into every combat theater with scheduled flights, while the Naval Air Transport Service centered its operations in the Pacific. Flying the "hump route across the Himalaya, the Air Transport Command's India-China Division delivered critically needed supplies to otherwise inaccessible China. On return trips to the United States both Army and Navy air transport planes brought sick and wounded men to hospitals near their homes. Air Transport Command crews also ferried replacement aircraft to combat air forces in various theaters. Science and Air Warfare "Wars are fought with weapons based on fundamentals discovered during the preceding years of peace, wrote Dr. Theodor von Karman in 1945. During World War II tremendous new scientific developments--electronics, jet propulsion, missiles and rockets, and nuclear weapons--influenced the conduct and potential of air warfare. The scientific fundamentals of each of these developments were known to all combatants well before the war, but their adaptation to military purposes depended on the initiative and productive capabilities of the belligerent nations. The working principles of the branch of electronics known as radar (radio detection and ranging) were well understood in the early 1930's in the United States, Great Britain, and Germany. Only the British, however, expedited the construction of a chain of radar early warning stations, which enabled an inferior force of RAF fighters to meet and defeat superior numbers of the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain. Radar facilitated offensive fighter control and accurate antiaircraft artillery direction, thereby reducing the ability of bombers to reach their targets. On the other hand, additional developments in radar enabled aircraft to perform precision bombing at night or in bad weather, thus increasing the capabilities of offensive aviation. Every phase of air operations also demanded the utmost development of other forms of electrical communications, and by the spring of 1945 about 12.5 percent of United States Army Air Forces personnel was assigned to some phase of electronics activity. One of the almost inexplicable puzzles of the war was the fact that early in the conflict Germany had air weapons within its grasp that might have redressed its growing aerial inferiority, and yet its Nazi masters failed to pursue their development. Arrogant after the defeat of Poland, Hitler refused to order full mobilization of Germany's economic potential for war until it was too late, and in 1940 he severely curtailed the development of new weapons that could not soon be available for combat. As a result of low development priorities and Allied bombing attacks, the Germans did not begin to employ their V-1 and V-2 missiles until June-September 1944, when the war was entering its final act. Because of indecision as to priorities and Hitler's insistence that the plane must carry bombs, the Me-262 jet fighter was not put into series production until November 1944. The operational employment of this new jet aircraft (superior by far to any Allied fighter) was too late to have any decisive influence on the air war.
Before the war strategic air warfare enthusiasts had overestimated
the effect of air ordinance on urban and industrial targets. They had assumed
erroneously that air attacks would easily break an enemy people's will to
continue a war. Both in Europe and in Japan repeated air attacks
Robert Frank Futrell
|