When Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, and Germany and Italy joined Japan four days later in declaring war against the United States, intelligence essential for the Army Air Forces to conduce effective warfare in the European and Pacific theaters did not exist. The manuscript tells the intriguing story of how airmen build intelligence organizations to collect and process information about the enemy and to produce and disseminate intelligence to decision makers and warfighters in the bloody, horrific crucible of war. More that organizational history, this manuscript reveals the indispensable and necessary secret role intelligence plays in effectively waging war. It examines World War II as a watershed period for Air Force Intelligence and for the acquisition and use of signals intelligence, photo reconnaissance intelligence, human resources intelligence, and scientific and technical intelligence. Air Force History and Museums Program.

Piercing the Fog: Intelligence and Army Air Forces Operations in World War II

History

Kreis, John F.

Museums Program, Air Force History and

Military

CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

On March 15, 1916, the 1st Aero Squadron arrived at Columbus, New Mexico, its train steaming into the crowded, chaotic town at 9:15 in the morning. Led by Capt. Benjamin D. Foulois, a lantern-jawed, bantam-weight former enlisted man, the squadron included eleven officers, eighty-two enlisted men, and one civilian technician. Under Foulois’s direction, the men unloaded an automobile, six motorcycles, and twelve motor trucks, vehicles rare in 1916 New Mexico and even rarer in an army still wedded to the horse and mule. These were followed by wooden crates containing eight wood, wire, and fabric Curtiss JN–3 biplanes, every airplane owned by the U.S. Army, save those assigned to its aviation school at San Diego, California. The squadron was in Columbus to join an expedition commanded by Brig. Gen. John J. “Black Jack” Pershing. President Woodrow Wilson had ordered Pershing’s force into Mexico in response to a March 9 attack on the tiny border town by the Mexican desperado, Francisco “Pancho” Villa. The event was auspicious. For the first time, the U.S. Army’s entire air force—the 1st Aero Squadron—had deployed for an active campaign. The course of the Punitive Expedition can be quickly summarized. Pershing’s forces crossed into Mexico on March 15, 1916, and for the next month, several carefully coordinated cavalry columns pressed southward hrough the state of Chihuahua in an effort to locate Villa, while trying to avoid confrontations with troops loyal to the Mexican government, who were unhelpful at best and often downright unfriendly. Behind the cavalry, the expedition was supported along a lengthening line of communications extending from Columbus through bases at Colonia Dublán, Namiquipa, Bachíniva, SanAntonio de los Arenales, and Satevó, the last over three hundred miles from the United States. The hard-riding cavalry ultimately reached Parral, another seven-ty miles south of Satevó, where a fight with Mexican government forces on April 15 marked the southern terminus of the American advance. Subsequently, at the limit of his logistic capability and concerned about threats to his extended line of communications, Pershing assumed a defensive posture. He organized the area controlled by the Punitive Expedition into districts, each patrolled by a cavalry regiment that harried guerrillas and kept an eye on government forces. Pershing maintained this position until the Punitive Expedition withdrew from Mexico early in 1917. The 1st Aero Squadron played a significant role in the Punitive Expedition, but, in dramatic contrast to how an air force functions today, it served as a means of communication and observation, not as a combatant arm. Some experiments with bombs and machine guns had been conducted, and the war in Europe was quickly turning the airplane into a serious weapon of war. Nevertheless, U.S. Army leaders envisioned aviation’s primary mission to be the receipt and trans mission of information for tactical commanders and long-distance scouting as an adjunct to the cavalry. Accordingly, during the mobile phase of the Punitive Expedition, the 1st Aero Squadron enabled Pershing to locate and communicate with his widely dispersed, fast-moving columns and carried dispatches between Pershing’s main and advanced bases. The squadron also scouted for hostile forces and kept a watch for threats to Pershing’s line of communications. As will be seen, these efforts were made in some of the worst weather and poorest conditions imaginable, and by the end of April, all eight airplanes had been destroyed. During the static phase of the Punitive Expedition, the 1st Aero Squadron remained at Columbus, where Foulois and his men operated a test and evaluation program for a wide variety of airplanes and aviation equipment. During both phases of the campaign, the officers and men of the 1st Aero Squadron learned lessons about airplanes, equipment, and operations in the field that would be applied in France less than a year later.

A Preliminary to War: The 1st Aero Squadron and the Mexican Punitive Expedition of 1916

Miller, Roger G.

This is an institutional history of flight training by the predecessor organizations of the United States Air Force. The U.S. Army purchased its first airplane, built and successfully flown by Orville and Wilbur Wright, in 1909, and paced both lighter-and heavier-than-air aeronautics in the Division of Military Aeronautics of the Signal Corps. Americans flew combat missions in France during World War I and during World War II. During this first era of military aviation, the groundwork was laid for the independent United States Air Force. This document is primarily based on official documents that are house in the National Archives and Records Administration. It is the first definitive study of this important subject.

Training to Fly - Military Flight Training 1907-1945

Cameron, Rebecca Hancock

In commemoration of the Korean War, the U.S. Air Force History Program published several works. One is this manuscript, a companion volume to the air war chronology entitled The USAF in Korea: A Chronology, 1950–1953, which details monthly and daily USAF activities and operations in the theater. This pamphlet, The USAF in Korea: Campaigns, Units, and Stations, 1950– 1953, provides information on the ten combat campaigns of the Korean War and gives an organizational view of tactical and support organizations carrying out combat operations. It also locates organizations or elements of organizations at their stations in Korea during the war and identifies designated K-Sites. The first part of the manuscript describes and illustrates the Korean service medal and service streamer and the ten designated campaigns of the Korean War. Accompanied by pertinent maps, the campaign narratives are general and selective rather than comprehensive, with each summary highlighting aerial combat. This section is extracted from Dr. A. Timothy Warnock’s reference work Air Force Combat Medals, Streamers, and Campaigns (Washington: USGPO, 1990). The second section comprises briefs on the combat flying organizations and a selected number of combat support organizations that operated in the theater. In instances where the tactical group and wing of the same number began combat at different times, the first to enter combat is summarized first; if both began operational missions at the same time, information on the parent wing is given first. Each brief in section two contains an operational summary of a given organization’s activities in the war, but specific information in the Chronology is not repeated here. Next, where pertinent, is a listing of flying or mission components. Following that is an organization’s station list based on information in the organization’s histories; in some cases, the station shown in the brief will not agree with the station listings found in the third section of. The commanders of groups and wings are listed next, and where applicable, Korean War campaign streamers, Korean War decorations, and Medal of Honor recipients are identified. The organizations’ official emblems at the time of the Korean War appear with their descriptions or blazons. The third part of the manuscript contains the available official lists of Air Force units and organizations located in Korea, extracted directly from the bimonthly publication, Directory of USAF Organizations, issued by HQ USAF DCS/Comptroller. These listings date from July 1, 1950, which showed no USAF unit or organization located in Korea, to July 1, 1953, which listed stations and organizations located in Korea just before the end of the conflict. Unfortunately, we were not able to locate two issues of this series — May 1, 1951, and July 1, 1951. The issue of April 1952 was a special edition; then, the series reverted to bimonthly issues. These lists appear exactly as shown in the directories. The data contained in each issue reflects information provided by FEAF and other commands to the HQ USAF, Directorate of Statistical Services, Machine Accounting Division, through the end of the previous month. In some instances, the inputs did not specifically identify the location of an organization, leaving the reader to guess whether an organization was located in the town or at a nearby air base or airdrome. Rendering Korean place names in English inevitably results in a variety of spellings, and these lists are no exception. For example, the location generally known in USAF documents as Kangnung is in these lists consistently spelled as Kangnumg. The final section is a listing, both numerically and alphabetically, of locations in Korea identified as K-Sites. The place name spellings used are those found in Fifth Air Force general orders designating the K-Sites and other official Fifth Air Force documents. Also included is a map of Korea that approximately locates each K-Site.

The USAF in Korea: Campaigns, Units and Stations 1950-1953

Endicott, Judy G.

Asia

The fight for air superiority began the day the Korean War started and only ended with the armistice three years later. Once the shock of the North Koreans’ invasion wore off, it did not take long for the United States Air Force, assisted by other United Nations air forces, to destroy the North Korean Air Force. The arrival of the MiG–15 in November 1950, often flown by Soviet pilots, changed things considerably however. For the remainder of the war, bitterly contested air battles were fought almost daily. Yet despite a decided numerical superiority in jet fighters, the Communists were never able to gain air superiority, testament to the skill and training of the UN fighter pilots, primarily those U.S. Air Force airmen flying the magnificent F–86 Sabre.

MIG ALLEY: The Fight for Air Superiority: The U.S. Air Force in Korea

Y'Blood, William T.

Book by Nalty, Bernard C, Museums Program, Air Force History and

The War Against Trucks: Aerial Interdiction in Southern Laos 1968-1972

Nalty, Bernard C.

No experience etched itself more deeply into Air Force thinking than the air campaigns over North Vietnam. Two decades later in the deserts of Southwest Asia, American airmen were able to avoid the gradualism that cost so many lives and planes in the jungles of Southeast Asia. Readers should come away from this book with a sympathetic understanding of the men who bombed North Vietnam. Those airmen handled tough problems in ways that ultimately reshaped the Air Force into the effective instrument on display in the Gulf War. This book is a sequel to Jacob Van Staaveren’s Gradual Failure: The Air War over North Vietnam, 1965–1966, which we have also declassified and are publishing. Wayne Thompson tells how the Air Force used that failure to build a more capable service—a service which got a better opportunity to demonstrate the potential of air power in 1972. Dr. Thompson began to learn about his subject when he was an Army draftee assigned to an Air Force intelligence station in Taiwan during the Vietnam War. He took time out from writing To Hanoi and Back to serve in the Checkmate group that helped plan the Operation Desert Storm air campaign against Iraq. Later he visited Air Force pilots and commanders in Italy immediately after the Operation Deliberate Force air strikes in Bosnia. During Operation Allied Force over Serbia and its Kosovo province, he returned to Checkmate. Consequently, he is keenly aware of how much the Air Force has changed in some respects—how little in others. Although he pays ample attention to context, his book is about the Air Force. He has written a well-informed account that is both lively and thoughtful.

To Hanoi and Back: The United States Air Force and North Vietnam 1966-1973

Thompson, Wayne

Decisive Force: Strategic Bombing in the Gulf War

In the Persian Gulf War the U.S. Air Force (USAF) demonstrated that a new era in strategic bombing had begun. Air power could now destroy key portions of a county’s military and economic infrastructure without resort to nuclear weapons and heavy bombers and with low losses to both the attacker and enemy civilians. This achievement rested on technology, which both increased bombing accuracy and decreased the effectiveness of enemy defenses, and the reexamination and reapplication of traditional strategic bombing theory by USAF planning officers.

Davis, Richard G.

Spanning the decades form the beginning of the Cold War to today’s strategy of global engagement, the twenty-three operational summaries in this book illustrate each of the objective for military operations other than wart. The USAF conducted each of these contingencies in a combat zone or area of serious civil disturbance. Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, a series of geographically localized crises caused by political, religious or ethnic unrest; outright military aggression; and natural disasters has replaced the relative stability that characterized international relations for more than 50 years of the Cold War. For the United States Air Force, this has meant short notice deployments, air lifts, and other operational missions conducted in reaction to local crises. Such missions have come to dominate Air Force Operations.

Short of War: Major U.S.A.F. Contingency Operations

Warnock, A Timothy

This volume deals with the early years of the United States Air Force’s effort to build and maintain a strategic striking force, for 1945 through 1953. It discusses the period of reorganization in national defense in the years after the end of the Second World War, as Army Defense Forces dealt with the questions of structure, doctrine, strategy, atomic weapons, and technology. Crucial decisions were made at the end of 1947 and that beginning of 1948, but fiscal austerity limited the new United States Air Force in implementing those decisions. The war in Korea triggered and expansion of the armed forces that culminated in a new look of the Eisenhower administration and emphasized nuclear air power as the foundation of a national strategy of containment and deterrence.

Building a Strategic Air Force

Moody, Walton S.

Americas

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