Herman S. Wolk
Senior Air Force Historian
"The Struggle for an Independent Air Force"
Air & Space Conference and Technology Exposition 2005
September 13, 2005
[Click here for printer-friendly version]
Mr. Wolk: I had the privilege this morning of sitting in on the Four-Star Forum featuring USAF Chief of Staff General T. Michael Moseley and the MAJCOM commanders, and I'm sure that a few of you here also sat in on that. It was very interesting to me as a historian. What were they talking about? They were talking about how to organize and employ air forces. They were talking about the control of air forces. That subject is as old as the air weapon itself, and it goes back to the early part of the century.
Coming out of World War I, the basic functions of air power had been demonstrated, namely reconnaissance, tactical and strategic. So this question of who was to control this new air weapon, who was to control air forces, was a prominent question in national security and national affairs in the 1920s and the 1930s. It's amazing to think today, decades later, that the same question is pertinent.
The fact of the matter is that in the 1920s and 1930s, on many occasions, legislation was introduced on Capitol Hill to establish a single, independent Department of Aeronautics. Even with the establishment of the Air Corps Act in 1926, this question remained. It even became more charged in the 1930s, and some of you who have studied history a little bit may recall the Baker Board of 1934, which came to the conclusion that an independent air force was not required. In fact, the Baker Board stated that, "The idea that aviation acting alone can control sea lanes or defend the coast or produce decisive results in any other general mission contemplated under our policy are all visionary; as is the idea that a very large and independent Air Force is necessary to defend our country against air attack."
Now, despite the report of the Baker Board and, incidentally, Jimmy Doolittle was on the Baker Board and he dissented from the Baker Board, but the board did pave the way to establish America's first Air Force. It was called the GHQ Air Force.
The General Headquarters Air Force became the entity that for the first time in American military history undertook to take all the air forces and encapsulate them in one entity—all the tactical air forces. That force, the GHQ Air Force, established on the first of March, 1935, came under the command of Brigadier General Frank Maxwell Andrews. Frank Andrews was a highly regarded conceptual Airman. He took over GHQ, as I mentioned, in 1935. At that time, of course, the GHQ Airmen, the Army Airmen, were still under the War Department, under the United States Army, and the head of the Army Air Corps, which as I said was formed in 1926 under General Oscar Westover.
General Westover's view was this. He said to the Airmen who were struggling at that time (and with some support in the Congress to form an independent Air Force), “be patient. These men of the War Department General Staff know what they're doing.” But Frank Andrews, among others (and Hap Arnold was around at that time also), was a bit impatient. He was a foremost advocate of the B-17 which was coming more or less online. He had 13 of them at Langley Air Force Base in 1936. So there was a bit of a contentious aura between Andrews and Westover.
It was General Andrews who in 1937, appearing before the Congress and the Military Affairs Committee, said this: "I do not believe that any balanced plan to provide the nation with an adequate, effective air force can be obtained within the limitations of the War Department budget and without providing an organization individual to the needs of such an air force and legislation to establish such an organization will continue to appear until this turbulent and vital problem is satisfactorily solved."
What was it specifically? What was it that these Army Airmen desired? Basically it was three things. They wanted their own promotion list, they wanted their own budget, and they wanted to be able to state their own air requirements directly to the Congress of the United States without going through the filter of the War Department General Staff, that is the Army Staff. And that was really a constant thread in the 1920s and the 1930s.
Now, after Franklin Roosevelt became President, and we know in the late '30s a war was brewing in Europe, and on the first of September, 1939, the German blitzkrieg invaded Poland. And President Roosevelt, who was a former Assistant Secretary of the Navy, said, “we need air power. We need more military aircraft.” And Hap Arnold always went back to that day in November 1938 when Franklin Roosevelt invited him and several others to the White House and Arnold called it the Magna Carta when Roosevelt said, "we need airplanes, we need lots of them, because in a conflict that may be upcoming they'll be very important, no doubt, and may well be decisive.”
There was a problem here. Hap Arnold was attempting to build up the Army Air Forces (AAF)—actually it was still the Air Corps at that time, it wasn't the AAF until 1941. But Franklin Roosevelt in the late '30s and the early '40s, as we got near to the Battle of Britain, was desperately trying to keep the Brits in the war against the Nazis, and Roosevelt's idea was to send a great deal of these production aircraft coming off-line to the British. Not only to send them to the British to keep them in the war, but to send them to the French, to send them to the Russians and to send them to the Chinese. As Arnold put it, “every day or every other day I was getting somebody who was saying, ‘by golly, Hap, you've got to send aircraft over to the British, you've got to send aircraft to the French, you've got to send aircraft to the Chinese.’”
As a matter of fact, there was a plan prior to the American entry into the war in 1941 to send 100 B-17s to China, and this plan was getting a bit of a push from the government, and the Chinese Ambassador to the United States of course was for it. Franklin Roosevelt got pretty enthusiastic about this plan, until General George Marshall, who had a good ear with Hap Arnold, stepped in and told Secretary of War Henry Stimson, “by God Henry, we can't afford to send 100 of anything to the Chinese. We'd love to do it, but Hap Arnold here is trying to build up an Air Force for America in the event we get involved in the war.”
So there was a bit of a problem between Hap Arnold and FDR. And, in fact, Arnold in his memoir says, “I was actually afraid I was going to be relieved.” There was a meeting in the White House to which Arnold was invited later on. Again, this was prior to the American entry into the war. And FDR looked right at Hap Arnold and he said, "You know, there's a place we can send people who don't play ball." He was saying, “play ball or you're liable to find yourself out in Guam.” In fact, Guam was the exact place FDR had in mind when he made his comment.
But the good part of the story is that American industry and American production was so terrific that of course we kept Britain in the war as well as building up Army Air Forces.
Once the United States got into the war, there was another obsession, I call it, of General Arnold's. That obsession was the B-29. This goes back to the days of Billy Mitchell. And, just as a footnote here, when we talk of Billy Mitchell, we always think of that court martial, but Billy Mitchell was a conceptualizer. He was a man who knew how to organize air forces. We could spend a day talking about that, but I just wanted to throw that in as kind of an asterisk.
But Roosevelt, as an Assistant Secretary of the Navy, really was able to grasp the importance that air power was going to have in World War II, and Hap Arnold was determined to get that B-29 long range bomber operational. And in what we call the famous Battle of Kansas, in 1942 or 1943 after American entry into the war, Hap Arnold fired about 40 colonels and generals out in Kansas to get that B-29 operational to send out into the Pacific. You all know the story then, in the fall of 1944 the B-29 went out into the Pacific under General Haywood “Possum” Hansell.
But prior to that, one of the great events in Air Force history took place in June. That was the establishment of the 20th Air Force. The establishment of the 20th Air Force was an unprecedented event. Why is that so? Because General Hap Arnold in Washington was the Executive Agent of the Joint Chiefs of Staff commanding the 20th Air Force. Not out in the Marianas, but in Washington. The Chief of Staff of the 20th Air Force, reporting directly to Arnold in Washington, was General Lauris Norstad.
When General Hansell took those B-29s out to the Pacific between October 1944 and January 1945, they were not performing as General Arnold wanted them to perform. Now, General Arnold deservedly had the reputation as being impatient. That's the kind of a man you wanted leading the air forces in World War II. He was impatient.
Another asterisk if I might—a little bit later on in the war, General Arnold sent a message to General George C. Kenney, the Commander of the Far East Air Forces who was under General Douglas MacArthur in the Southwest Pacific. Hap Arnold said to George Kenney, “George, you and I know there is a lot of deadwood in the Army Air Forces. I want you to draw me up a list”—because Kenney was a veteran, a very sharp guy, as Arnold knew. He was known as Arnold's troubleshooter. But he said to Kenney, “George, you draw me up a list of people you think we should bring back to the States; people who should no longer should be in the operational theater.” This is what Arnold said in closing that message to Kenney: "George, in this activity, remember, you have no friends."
So that's a little picture of Hap Arnold. When Hap Arnold wanted to get those B-29s operational and make an impact, his idea was that a modern industrial nation could be driven out of the war without need of an invasion. It was a race against time, as Arnold saw it. So he sent General Curtis LeMay out to the Pacific to replace General Hansell.
Here's another little asterisk on Arnold. General Norstad, who saw Arnold on a daily basis, because Norstad, as I said, was the Chief of Staff of the 20th, he noted in late December or early January 1945 that General Arnold was getting very frustrated with the lack of progress of the B-29 campaign. Norstad said to Arnold, “General, you don't seem satisfied.” Arnold said, “hell no, I'm not satisfied.” Norstad said, “if that's the case, you're going to have to relieve our friend Possum out there.” He said, “I suspect you'll want to send General LeMay out there.” Arnold said, “that's right.” Norstad said, “well you just can't do it from Washington. You've got to go out to the Pacific, to the Marianas, and tell Possum in person.” Arnold said, “I can't do it. I just can't do it.” So, as a result, it was up to Norstad once again to carry the bad news and it was Norstad who went out to the Pacific, called General LeMay in from the China-Burma-India theater, and made the change.
Between January and March 1945, there was no change in the campaign. The B-29s were still going in too high. The jet stream was still there. LeMay told me in retrospect that he had only five or six good bombing days a month and that was it. So, in one of the great decisions of World War II, and in my view one of the great decisions in American military history, General LeMay made a decision in March 1945 to go in over Japan at low level at night, between 6,000 and 9,000 feet. That raid on Tokyo on March 10, 1945, was the most destructive bombing raid in military history—more destructive than either of the atomic bomb attacks. And between March and July 1945, which was the date of the Potsdam Conference, the bombing campaign and the incendiary campaign was really what turned the Pacific war around.
Of course, the Pacific war was not won by the Army Air Forces alone, because it was really a joint effort. The blockade had been very effective; the submarines. The mining campaign carried out by the B-29s was also very effective. The Marines captured the Marianas and led all the island campaigns. So it was a true joint effort that brought victory in World War II. But certainly the B-29s were a very important factor in that and therefore World War II was the turning point in the drive for an independent Air Force.
This was realized by a number of people who were not Airmen, and among these people there were two in particular. One was President Harry S. Truman; the other was General Dwight D. Eisenhower. After the war, Truman was very upset and frustrated by the lack of communications that, as he saw it, resulted in the Pearl Harbor attack.
And let me give you another footnote in history. In January 1941, months and months before the Pearl Harbor attack, the Secretary of the Navy sent a letter to Secretary of War Henry Stimson saying that, “recent naval intelligence and recent naval planning show that the Japanese have successfully tested torpedo bomber attacks and various other tactics and strategy which indicate, potentially, an attack on the fleet at Pearl Harbor.” Specifically, this letter to the United States Secretary of War said this could result in an attack on the fleet at Pearl Harbor. This was January 1941. I just throw that out as another footnote.
But the point was that Truman was really disturbed about the entire Pearl Harbor affair. He was determined not only that we needed an independent United States Air Force, but that we needed a national security structure for the modern era, for modern conflict. Truman was determined to do this. So right after World War II, in October and November of 1945, the Senate Military Affairs Committee held hearings on reorganization of the American defense establishment, and one of the first people they called in was the crusader from Europe, General Ike Eisenhower.
General Eisenhower, with his commanding reputation and his commanding presence, came into the hearing room and the Chairman of the Senate Military Affairs Committee said, “we're delighted to have you, General Eisenhower, would you like to sit down?” And General Eisenhower said, “no, I'll stand if you don't mind.” He said he had released a prepared statement, but he said, “I would like to depart, if I may, from this prepared statement to tell you this…” Direct quote: "The Normandy invasion was based on a deep-seated faith in the power of the air forces in overwhelming number to intervene in the land battle. That is, that the air forces by their action could have the effect on the ground of making it possible for a small force to invade a continent in which there were 61 enemy divisions—and we couldn't possibly put more than seven divisions ashore on the first day. Without that air force, without its independent power—entirely aside from its ability to sweep the enemy out of the sky—without its power to intervene in the land battle, that invasion would have been fantastic. Unless we had faith in air power as a fighting arm to intervene and make safe, that landing, it would have been more than fantastic. It would have been criminal."
It's interesting that General Ike Eisenhower always had an affinity for Airmen. General Eisenhower learned to fly in the Philippines in the 1930s. He always felt, as he put it, “you know, I really could have been a pilot. You know, I really could have been ‘a crack Airman.’” And he had a terrific relationship with General Tooey Spaatz in North Africa and in Europe. I've always considered General Eisenhower to be a founder of the United States Air Force.
When General Arnold testified on Capital Hill for an independent Air Force after World War II, his words were expected. But when Eisenhower, with his great reputation, of course well deserved, came up and said, to paraphrase, “you know, I'm going to tell you, to me, no sane person can now stand in the way of an establishment of a separate Air Force and a new national security organization for the United States.” And a separate Air Force, as Ike Eisenhower saw it, that was part of it, but the whole thing was unified command. Joint command was one thing, but what we needed was unified command, and unified command from the top to the bottom. That was the “seed corn,” you might say, of the national security organization, the National Security Act of 1947.
One of the important figures in addition to Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower was General Lauris Norstad. General Norstad, the Chief of Staff of the 20th Air Force, had been an air planner in North Africa and in Europe during World War II. He had two very important mentors in his career. The first one was General Arnold, who saw him as a young officer and brought him immediately in 1942 onto his advisory staff. Then Norstad's other mentor was Dwight Eisenhower. With the great support of Eisenhower after World War II, and the support of Secretary of War Robert P. Patterson and Stuart Symington, who later became the first Secretary of the Air Force, Norstad was able—first with Admiral Arthur W. Radford and then with Admiral Forrest Sherman—to draft the legislation for the National Security Act of 1947 which would form an independent Air Force.
Norstad was a very bright officer who had the ability to say, “what's the bottom line here? What are we trying to do? What do we need to do? What's the objective?” And he and Forrest Sherman developed a very good relationship.
I'd like to throw out now if I could another one of my footnotes, if you don't mind. This one I always delight in giving to you because when General Eisenhower came back from World War II he replaced George Marshall as the Chief of Staff of the Army, Chief of Staff of the War Department. When Eisenhower came back from Europe and came here to the Pentagon and Washington, he gathered the War Department staff, and this is what he said to them. Actually, I’d like to give it to you as kind of a management philosophy. This will be a direct quote.
Eisenhower said to his staff, "I'm here to try to do a job, but I realize it's you people who have to do the job. The best I can do is to keep you acquainted with decisions that come down from above, to give you the interpretations that I place on them, and where necessary, to make decisions within my province. But I propose to follow here the only system that I believe will work in a large command and a large degree of decentralization. I want every single one of you to feel a personal responsibility for what you do. There is no ducking behind anyone else. You do it. Follow your best judgment. You are expected to be completely responsible. If coordination is necessary, you are expected to get it. In following this system, the only thing I can promise you is 100 percent support. As long as you occupy a position of responsibility in any organization that I head, it means just this, that to the last minute you are there you have my confidence. If you don't have it, you won't be here. Now that ought to be fair for all of us, and you know that as long as you are doing a thing according to your best judgment, you will have my support, so long as I am here." I think that's pretty good.
Getting back to my opening point, with the question of who is to control air forces, how we organize and employ air forces... The formation of an independent Air Force was aimed to answer those questions, but it was part of Harry Truman's larger idea to structure a national security organization for the modern era. As we look back to 1947, which is 58 years ago, this month, since the establishment of the Air Force. It will be 60 years in 2007. That's not a long time. As historians look at it, it's a stitch in time; even with technology advancing at such a rapid pace.
General Arnold, as I've indicated in this talk, was always kind of criticized for being impatient, for being a shoot-from-the-hip guy. But the fact of the matter is that General Arnold, among his great traits, had an enormous amount of foresight. In his landmark and famous last report to the Secretary of War which was dated November 1945, he said, "You know, we have to look to the future. We may be facing a future where there are no manned aircraft; where there are missiles, robots." Remember, this was Arnold in 1945, and one of his final statements was, "The weapons of today are the museum pieces of tomorrow." I think there's a lesson there, too.
I remember General Possum Hansell once saying to me, “you know, this country was very fortunate in having the kind of leadership we had in World War II.” I think the questions of the control of air forces and how you organize and employ them are with us and just as important today as they were in the 1920s and 1930s in World War II and post-World War II.
So my final word here today is that these leaders, these American leaders—men like General Spaatz and General Eaker and General Arnold and General Marshall and General Eisenhower—if we study them just a little bit, they will have something to teach us today.
Questions, comments, observations?
Q: Did the Army and/or the Navy actively contest the establishment of an independent Air Force?
Mr. Wolk: The Navy did. Now this is a very interesting question that takes in kind of a multitude of things.
To get back to Eisenhower for one moment, historians and observers have sometimes said, “gee, you know, Eisenhower, the Army man, was a great supporter of an independent Air Force, but wasn't he doing this because he wanted to get the Airmen out of the Army so that they wouldn't eat up the entire Army budget after World War II?”
I don't think that's correct at all. I think Eisenhower supported an independent Air Force and the National Security Act because Eisenhower, being Eisenhower, thought it was the right thing to do.
Generally speaking, the War Department General Staff and the leadership of the United States Army pretty well supported the creation of an independent Air Force after World War II. Not so with the Navy, because the Navy came out of World War II convinced that their fast task forces, aviation, air carriers, the fast carriers, were the future of the Navy. They believed their air element could be lost in this post-war reorganization; and that maybe even the Marine Corps could be lost. That was a real fear. So the Navy opposed the creation of an independent Air Force.
The Navy said, “look, we just won World War II. The American military won victory in World War II. Why do we need a reorganization? We can have coordination through the joint committees of the Joint Chiefs of Staff just like we did in World War II. It was successful.” That was basically the Navy viewpoint.
Their viewpoint on the National Security Act of 1947 was that we should continue coordination instead of administration, and the irony was they got that in the National Security Act, and James Forestall was named the first Secretary of Defense. The problem was the system was one of coordination and it was too weak, and Forestall himself suffered under that system. That was the great irony of it.
Q: Could you touch on your discussions of history with General LeMay?
Mr. Wolk: I talked with General LeMay on three occasions. I did it with much trepidation. I found him very forthcoming and relaxed. This was in 1972, 1973. He came into Washington as part of his job to be on the Board of the National Geographic Magazine, the National Geographic Society. I found him very forthcoming, very easy to talk to. He was very low key, even about that decision to go low level at night in March 1945. He explained that they couldn't get the job done with those jet winds. They couldn't bomb more than four or five days during the month and they had to do something.
He was well aware that General Norstad in Washington had in effect said to him, “if you don't get results in the next few weeks you'll be fired because General Arnold is just determined that those B-29s get results.”
So I found General LeMay a delight. Of course this was in 1972. I'm sure he wasn't that way during World War II, but I found him very forthcoming, candid, and willing to answer any questions I had.
Q: I'd like to compliment you on the article you wrote in an issue of AIR FORCE Magazine a couple of months ago, the Norstad issue. I do not recall you talking about his role in the National Security Council in that article.
Mr. Wolk: I did somewhat. There were some quotes I had from him there that they took out because of space, which often happens when an author's article is edited. But no, I didn’t get to that in a great amount of detail, but if you want more detail on it—I hate to plug my own book here—you can see my book published in 1997, The Struggle for Air Force Independence. It was published by the Air Force History and Museums Program that Dick Anderegg heads up.
Thank you all so much for being here.
# # #