A
FEW months' experience in long
range daylight bombing under the
peculiar conditions of European air
warfare is now behind the US Army
Eighth Air Force. The RAF gained
some knowledge of the work and its
difficulties during the first year of the
war with forces which rarely exceeded
one-tenth of those normally sent down
on important missions by the bomber
command of the Eighth Air Force.
Since then, daylight raiding at long
range has been practiced only on
isolated occasions by the RAF. A
formation of Lancasters did good
work against the Messerschmitt works
at Augsburg on April 17, 1942, and a
bigger force ― some 90 Lancasters in
all ― made a resounding attack on the
Schneider works at Le Creusot,
France, on October 17, 1942. The
many raids made deep into Germany
by Fortresses and Liberators since
midsummer have been undertaken in
the face of the heaviest defenses the
Luftwaffe has been able to muster.
They will rank as classic examples
of that school of thought in air warfare
which holds that powerful defensive
fire is the best protection for a bomber
formation raiding in daylight over long
stretches of heavily defended enemy
territory. The RAF was firmly
committed to that policy for years
before the war. The US Army Air
Forces are still devoted to it. When
Gen Henry H Arnold was in England
during September he declared
forcefully his intention of using
cannon, rockets or whatever might be
necessary to get his bombers through
to targets in Germany.
Nothing could have been more
skillfully organized or more
courageously performed than those
great raids into eastern and southern
Germany. In every instance they were
successful. The quality of the bombing
was magnificent, as numerous
reconnaissance pictures taken after the
event have shown. The defensive work
done by the raiding formations must
have been equally good as judged by
the reports of enemy fighters shot
down. The majority of these fell to the
machine guns of the bombers and only
a small proportion were claimed by the
escorting fighters ― usually Repub1ic
Thunderbolts with long range tanks.
Here are two points to be noted in
any attempt to sum up the experience
gained by the large American
formations which are now operating in
Europe. The crossfire and the banked
or tiered fire of American formations
is highly effective. On the other hand,
the performance of a long range
fighter, never yet effective against that
of the interceptor fighter, has not, in
this instance, sufficed to protect the
bombers it escorted from close and
deadly combat. The cost of daylight
raiding at long range, therefore, still
remains high wherever the enemy can
direct large intercepting forces of high
performance aircraft against the
formations on the inward and outward
journeys.
General Arnold remarked that any
fighter attacking a Fortress formation
head-on (a favorite method of the
Germans for several months), would
have 48 guns bearing down on him. If
it tried to come in above, it would have
the fire of 50 guns to meet. That fire
undoubtedly proved formidable and
the Germans had to find some way of
attacking without entering that field of
fire. Recent reports have mentioned
the use of rocket shells and the
dropping of bombs on the bomber
formations from above. The latter
device probably need not be taken
seriously. As to the success of the
rocket shells nothing, of course, has
been said.
A strict security rule forbids handing
to the enemy any information which
would tell him whether one weapon is
proving more effective than another.
What can be said is that the Luftwaffe
has given a great deal of attention to
lengthening the range of its fire against
the American formations. There was a
time when the fighters tried to pick off
the flank machines with long range
shell fire then closed in to finish them
off as soon as they began to lag. At the
time of writing, rocket-driven shells
are being tried.
Whatever the truth may be about
tactics, there have occasionally been
heavy losses in the bomber formations.
On certain of the more hazardous
operations, such as those against the
Rumanian oilfields at Ploesti and the
big ball-bearing works at Schweinfurt,
heavy losses were to be expected and
were justly accepted in return for the
serious blows delivered at the enemy.
At times, the losses suffered on shorter
runs have seemed to be high, rising
perhaps to the neighborhood of 10 per
cent. If that should prove to be an
average rate of loss it would suggest
that, distance for distance, daylight
raiding with the best arrangements of
defensive armaments and grouping,
and with the aid of long range escorts,
is nearly twice as costly as night-
raiding.
If a balance-sheet had to be drawn
up for purposes of comparison many
things would have to be taken into
account. American daylight bombing
is precision bombing directed against
particular targets of special value to
the enemy. British night bombing is
area bombing directed against a whole
center of industrial activity. How much
productive capacity is destroyed for
each bomber lost on the respective
kinds of operation could only be
estimated if much more detailed
reports of the damage were available
than have yet been put at the disposal
of the press. Nor is any such
comparison the object of this survey.
The determining factor, when once the
strategic significance of a certain
bombing program has been
established, is the accepted
replacement rate.
Everything in the last resort depends
on production and training, provided
the spirit and efficiency of bomber
crews is not lowered by a sense of
being asked to undertake undue risks.
So long as the combat chances are
even the crews are content to take
them ― and the figures show that the
odds are still in favor of the bombers.
Production and training are moving
upwards and the replacement factor
seems likely to be able to meet the
circumstances in the European theater
and leave plenty of room for
expansion. In the long run the damage
done in Germany by the bombers
should weaken the fighter plane
opposition they have to meet in the air.
Nevertheless, losses are regrettable
whenever they have to be accepted and
at the present stage they are high
enough to warrant some consideration
of the less popular school of thought,
which, throughout the period of. the
self-defense creed, has held that the
finest protection for the bomber is
speed. This policy involves some
sacrifice in load and range. It also
involves putting some demands on the
bomber crew which informed opinion
has always declared could not safely
be imposed. It means asking a crew to
forego the chance of a scrap and to run
away instead. That, the experts have
said, is no way to treat a soldier and no
way to expect a soldier to allow
himself to be treated.
Nevertheless we in Great Britain
seem likely to give the idea a trial with
the Mosquito. As a bomber, it carries
no guns and its crew consists of only
two. Some idea of the range it can be
given with a fair bomb load is shown
by its frequent night raids on Berlin, a
round trip of 1,000 to 1,200 miles.
This is an airplane which is faster than
most fighters. It has escaped from
fighter attack by means of its speed
time after time and it does promise to
afford a test on a small scale, perhaps,
of the theory that speed is a bomber's
best protection against both flak and
fighter opposition.
The scale will have to be small
because of the demands that arise for
Mosquitoes for other purposes than
bombing. A fighter version has had
notable success over the Bay of Biscay
against German long range fighters
sent out to oppose the aircraft of the
RAF Coastal Command which attack
submarines near their home posts. The
Mosquito does excellent work on
photographic reconnaissance and there
are certain other duties it may
undertake. Large fleets of Mosquito
bombers, therefore, may not be built
up quickly but no signs have appeared
in the Mosquito squadrons of the RAF
that the crews resent their inability to
fight back. They seem well enough
pleased with the relative certainty of
getting back.
In a small country like Britain the
difficulty is more likely to be
operational. To deliver the same
weight of bombs as are now taken to
distant targets by the "heavies," twice
as many Mosquitoes would be needed.
Multiplying the force without
increasing the load would be judged
uneconomic in these days when high
concentrations of bombs are the aim
and yet, given speed of the order of the
Mosquito, two raids in quick
succession would probably yield
similar results. In the course of 1944
we undoubtedly shall have a chance to
see the theory in practice.
The alternative to using speed is to
develop the defenses of the bomber
formations. The Germans have already
accused the Eighth Air Force of using
"flying cruisers" carrying 30 guns
each. This idea was advocated by the
writer Golovine before the war. He
proposed the design of "destroyer"
aircraft for escort and defensive work.
Their use would be a logical
development of day raiding against
strong defenses, especially if, as is
likely, the arming of bombers with
long range guns should present
awkward problems.
For the main assault against
Germany both the United States and
Britain are committed to the heavy
type of bomber. It is too late now to
rearrange production training and
strategy on a new basis and the point
to be resolved is that of self-defense.
Rearmament plans develop slowly and
the solution will probably be found
partly in better escort aircraft and
partly in the increasing exhaustion of
Germany's power to oppose the air
raids by day and by night.
This column was originally published
in the January, 1944, issue of Flying
magazine, vol 34, no 1, pp 72, 160.
Photo credited to International News
Photos.
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