air doctrine 1917

8/2/2019 Air Doctrine 1917

1/15

Historical Highlights

MarchApril 2012 Air & Space Power Journal| 132

Developmentof Air Doctrine

1917 41*

James L. Cate

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Reprinted fromAir University Quarterly Review 1, no. 3 (Winter 1947): 1122.

*A paper read at the Fortieth Annual Meeting of the Mississippi Valley Historical Association, Columbus, Ohio; April 24,

1947. The author has written a fuller account of the growth of air doctrine in the first volume of a general history of

the Army Air Forces which should appear soon. Editor.1The United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Over-all Report(European War), September 30, 1945 (Washington, 1945),

p. 1.


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2Field Service Regulations, U. S. Army(Washington, 1924), p. 23.


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The reason k. Cl v mul m cm c v Gl S

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3 CM-OUT-576 (21 Feb. 42), Arnold to Chaney, AF #2/353, 21 Feb., 42 (paraphrased). [MS materials cited in this paperare from archives of the AAF Historical Office at Washington, D. C., except those coded AAG, which are from the

Air Adjutant Generals files.]4WD TC No. 70, Army Air Forces Basic Doctrine, 16 December 1941; a mimeographed pamphlet issued pending revision

of FM 1-5 and publication of FM 100-15.5Maj. W. R. Carter, Employment of Army Air Forces, 12 April 1938; in AAG 321.9, Doctrines of Air Corps, Unclassified

Files.6Wm. Mitchell, Our Armys Air Service, AmericanReview of Reviews, LXII (September, 1920), pp. 281-90.


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7Hearings before the Presidents Aircraft [Morrow] Board, I (Washington, 1925), 21.8Ibid., p. 23.9Report of the Secretary of War for Fiscal Year Ending June 30, 1919, in War Department, Annual Reports, 1919, I

(Washington, 1920), passim and especially pp. 68 ff.10Field Service Regulations, p. 77.

11Ibid., p. 11.

12T. R. No. 440-15, Fundamental Principles for the Employment of the Air Service (Washington, 26 January, 1926), para. 4.


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13ASTS, Langley Field, Va., Bombardment(Washington, 1926), p. 54.

14Ibid., p. 72.


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15H. A. Jones, The War in the Air, VI (Oxford, 1937), chs. III, IV.

16Ibid., Appendices No. V, VI, IX, X, and XIX (in separate volume).

17Wm. Mitchell, The Air Service at St. Mihiel, Worlds Work, XXXVIII (August, 1919), 360-70; The Air Service at

the Argonne-Meuse, Ibid. (September, 1919), pp. 552-60.


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oensive p, Our Air Force: the Keystone o National

Deense Winged Deense.19 Bu ll ccumlcu,

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18Wm. Mitchell, Our Air Force, The Keystone of National Defense (New York, 1921), p. 15.

19Winged Defense, The Development and Possibilities of Modern Air Power, Economic and Military(New York, 1925).


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20Skyways (Philadelphia, 1930), p. 253.

21Ibid., p. 255.

22New York Evening Post, quoted in Isaac D. Levine, Mitchell: Pioneer of Air Power(New York, 1943), p. 331.


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23Para. 22, a (31).

24ACTS Study of Proposed Air Corps Doctrine Submitted by WPD on 4 December 1934, Maxwell Field, 31 January 1935;

in AAG 321.9, Doctrine of Air Corps, Unclassified Files.25

Maj. Gen. B. C. Emmons, CG, GHG AF, to OCAC, Commercial Manufacturers of Aircraft, 12 June 1940; in AAG 452.1

C Heavy Bombers.


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26First ind., the Commandant, ACTS to C/AC, 30 April 1928, OCAC to Com mandant, ACTS, 1 September 1928; in AAG

321.9, Doctrines of Air Corps, Unclassified Files.27

Interview with Brig. Gen. H. S. Hansell at Norfolk House, England, 5 October 1943; in Eighth Air Force Files.28

Edward Warner, Douhet, Mitchell, Seversky, in E. M. Earle, ed., Makers of ModernStrategy(Princeton, 1944), p.

489.


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29Much of the substance of these lectures may be found in a paper by Gen. Hansell on Development of the U. S. Air

Forces Philosophy of Air Warfare Prior to our Entry into World War II. The present quotation is from a lecture by

Hansell himself in 1935/6, on The Functions of Air Power in our National Economy.30

Lecture by Capt. Harold L. George, Air Force Objectives, 1934/5, quoted in the same source.31

United States-British Staff Conversations, Short Title ABC-1, 27 March 1941, Para. 47.32

Munition Requirements of the AAF for the Defeat of Our Potential Enemies, Short Title AWPD/1, 12 August 1941.


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mm.

33See book review by Col. Dale O. Smith in this issue [Air University Quarterly Review, Winter 1947, 9598]. Editor.


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Prove their doctrine orthodox

By apostolic blows and knocks.

W m cul yu k c?

34Hansell to the author, 24 February 1947.


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The all-important initial crisis of any future war must be met by the Air Force

wehave when war starts. We cannot rely on a cadre Air Force, for during a war

of hours, days or weeks, we would have no time to expend it.

-- General Carl Spaatz,

in Colliers

(December 8, 1945)

James L. Cate, P.D., Ac P Mvl Hy Uv-

y Ccg, pjc Ofcial History o the AAF

in World War II.

air doctrine 1917

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