ROYAL AIR FORCE HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL 32 2 The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the contributors concerned and are not necessarily those held by the Royal Air Force Historical Society. Photographs credited to MAP have been reproduced by kind permission of Military Aircraft Photographs. Copies of these, and of many others, may be obtained via http://www.mar.co.uk Crown Copyright/MOD. The photographs on pages 78 & 137 have been reproduced with permission of the Controller of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office. Other credits are as follows: 10 via Frank Cheesman; 77 Lincolnshire Echo; 20, 43, 147, 149 & 151 US Official. First published in the UK in 2004 by the Royal Air Force Historical Society All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the Publisher in writing. ISSN 1361 4231 Printed by Advance Book Printing Unit 9 Northmoor Park Church Road Northmoor OX29 5UH 3 CONTENTS THE TAIL TO TOOTH RATIO – ROYAL FLYING CORPS 8 AND AIR SERVICE CO-OPERATION IN MAINTENANCE TRAINING DURING WW I by Dr Roger G. Miller THE RAF AND THE US ARMY AIR CORPS BETWEEN THE 28 WARS by Air Cdre Henry Probert RAF-USAAF CO-OPERATION IN AIR SUPPORT IN NORTH 36 AFRICA DURING WW II by Dr Daniel Mortensen RISING FROM THE ASHES: ALLIED AIR POWER AND AIR 55 SUPPORT FOR THE 14th ARMY IN BURMA, 1943-1945 by Dr Sebastian Ritchie MORNING DISCUSSION 68 THE THOR IRBM by Dr Jacob Neufeld 72 RAF-USAF AIR POWER IN GERMANY DURING THE COLD 83 WAR by AVM Stuart Peach RAF-USAF CO-ORDINATION FOR COMMAND AND 94 CONTROL IN THE 1990-91 PERSIAN GULF WAR by Dr Mark D Mandeles AN RAF COMMANDER’S VIEW OF CO-OPERATION IN 111 THE 1990-91 GULF WAR by Air Chf Mshl Sir William Wratten AFTERNOON DISCUSSION 122 SUPPLEMENTARY PAPERS: THE JOINT COMMANDER’S OVERVIEW OF RAF/USAF 133 OPERATIONS IN THE 1991 GULF WAR by Air Chf Mshl Sir Patrick Hine ON EXCHANGE WITH THE UNITED STATES AIR FORCE - 140 A 1970s PERSPECTIVE by Gp Capt Richard Bates OPERATION TORCH – A SPECIFIC INSTANCE OF 146 RAF/USAAF CO-OPERATION condensed from the memoirs of AVM Sir Laurence Sinclair by the Editor JOHN TERRAINE – AN OBITUARY 152 FEEDBACK 153 BOOK REVIEWS 154 4 ROYAL AIR FORCE HISTORICAL SOCIETY President Marshal of the Royal Air Force Sir Michael Beetham GCB CBE DFC AFC Vice-President Air Marshal Sir Frederick Sowrey KCB CBE AFC Committee Chairman Air Vice-Marshal N B Baldwin CB CBE FRAeS Vice-Chairman Group Captain J D Heron OBE Secretary Group Captain K J Dearman Membership Secretary Dr Jack Dunham PhD CPsychol AMRAeS Treasurer J Boyes TD CA Members Air Commodore H A Probert MBE MA *J S Cox Esq BA MA *Dr M A Fopp MA FMA FIMgt *Group Captain C J Finn MPhil RAF *Wing Commander W A D Carter RAF Wing Commander C Cummings Editor & Publications Wing Commander C G Jefford MBE BA Manager *Ex Officio 5 SELECTED ABBREVIATIONS AAA Anti-Aircraft Artillery AAF (US) Army Air Force AEF American Expeditionary Forces AFB (US) Air Force Base ATO Air Tasking Order C2 Command and Control C3I Command, Control, Communications and Information (or Intelligence) CAOC Combined Air Operations Centre CAS Close Air Support CENTCOM (US) Central Command COMCENTAF Commander (US) Air Force, Central Command FDR Franklin Delano Roosevelt FM (US) Field Manual GWAPS Gulf War Air Power Survey ICBM Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile IRBM Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile JFACC Joint Force Air Component Commander KTO Kuwait Theatre of Operations LGB Laser Guided Bomb LLAD Low Level Air Defence ORB Operations Record Book (RAF Form 540) ROE Rules of Engagement SAC Strategic Air Command SAM Surface-to-Air Missile SEAD Suppression of Enemy Air Defences SMW Strategic Missile Wing USAMEAF United States Army Middle East Air Force WDAF Western Desert Air Force WDD Western Development Division Note on Spelling. To make the text more comfortable to read in the Old Country, I have taken the liberty of imposing the Society’s house style and anglicising most of the transatlantic renderings of the spelling of our common language, although I have generally respected the ‘colonial’ versions where they form part of the formal title of an appointment or institution. Ed 6 d.. r o f x u D t a m u e s u M F A S U e h o t t t si vi r ei h g t n ri u d 7 1 - B s ’ M W I e h h t t i w e s o p m a e T g n i t si i V e h T 7 AIR POWER – ANGLO-AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES. RAF MUSEUM, HENDON, 21st OCTOBER 2003 WELCOME ADDRESS BY THE SOCIETY’S CHAIRMAN Air Vice-Marshal Nigel Baldwin CB CBE FRAeS Ladies and Gentlemen It is a pleasure for me not just to welcome the members of our own Society but, most particularly, friends from the US Air Force Historical Foundation for this joint seminar. We last met in this country in October 1990 when we looked at our activities together between 1941 and 1945. We recorded the papers and discussion that day in the Society’s Journal No 9. This time we are going back much further, even to WW I, but we will also come up to date with a look at the first Gulf War some ten years ago. Our visitors are led by their President, Lieutenant General Mike Nelson. He has just taken over from General Bill Smith whose initiative underpinned the visit and who chose today’s subject. So, this afternoon, General Smith will chair the session. This morning, we will be in the safe hands of Sir Richard Johns who needs little introduction to the members of the Society, but for the benefit of our visitors, perhaps I should point out a few of the highlights of his career: he taught the Prince of Wales to fly; he commanded the Royal Air Force’s Harrier base in Germany; he was Commander-in-Chief of Strike Command, a senior NATO commander and he completed his career as our Chief of the Air Staff (the equivalent of the USAF’s Chief of Staff). In his retirement, he luxuriates in an 11th Century castle just west of London overlooking Runnymede by order of Her Majesty the Queen…. But before Sir Richard takes the chair, let me just thank Dr Michael Fopp and his staff here at the Museum for their usual help and interest in us, and for the use of their splendid facilities – without them I don’t know what we would do. 8 THE TAIL TO TOOTH RATIO – ROYAL FLYING CORPS AND AIR SERVICE CO-OPERATION IN MAINTENANCE TRAINING DURING WW I Dr Roger G. Miller A former USAF officer, Dr Miller has been an historian since 1980 and has served as such at air force installations ranging from Denver, Colorado to Sembach, West Germany. He is currently on the staff of the Air Force History Support Office at Bolling AFB, Washington, DC where, among other activities, he administers the History of Air Power courses run for the benefit of the Air Force Intern Program and for personnel involved with the Air Force History and Museums Program. Little need exists here to detail the size, strength, and capability of the US Army at the time the United States declared war on the Central Powers in April 1917. Simply put, in every way possible, the US was incapable of sending a modern army to fight in Europe. A British military mission that reached Washington, DC a few weeks after the declaration accurately summarised the situation in four laconic, well- chosen words: ‘They are quite unprepared.’1 Seldom has the British talent for understatement been more appropriate. This situation, especially in the eyes of British and French leaders, would be complicated over the next year by the American determination to field a separate, independent US Army and a stubborn refusal to ‘amalgamate’ with the Allied armies.2 We could spend hours discussing the controversy over amalgamation, but suffice to say that Secretary of War Newton Baker’s instructions to the commander of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) Gen John J Pershing, issued on 26 May 1917, were clear and firm: ‘In military operations…….you are directed to co-operate with the forces of the other countries employed against the enemy, but in so doing the underlying idea must be kept in view that the forces of the United States are a separate and distinct component of the combined forces, the identity of which must be preserved.’3 And, as European leaders would soon discover, probably no American general between ‘Mad’ 9 Anthony Wayne and ‘Storming’ Norman Schwarzkopf could be more relentlessly determined to follow instructions – especially those he agreed with – than ‘Black Jack’ Pershing.4 Thus, the essential question was reduced to how best to organise, train, equip and deploy an independent US army starting from almost nothing. The answer, readily apparent to all competent observers, was that a timely American presence on the Western Front could only be attained through extraordinary assistance from the Allied powers. Since the United States would receive the vast majority of its modern war materials from France; since the AEF would be assembled and learn its trade in the heart of France; and since the Americans would take their place in the trenches on the eastern part of the Western Front, distant from the British army, it was logical that much of its preparation and training would be in French hands. Where ground warfare was concerned, this logic pretty much held true. When it came to aviation, however, the story was a good bit different. Despite the fact that the Air Service, AEF,5 would ultimately accept over 4,800 aircraft from the French, and less than 300 from the British, and despite the establishment of aviation instruction centres throughout France, the US Army leaned heavily on the Royal Flying Corps (RFC)6 in its preparations for combat in the air, and in doing so, it began a tradition of mutual co-operation between the Royal Air Force and the US Air Force that has endured on many fields of conflict until the present day.7 Several reasons underlay this development. Most important, undoubtedly, was the common language and heritage. The close presence of Canada and the role it played in the RFC training programme offers another reason. Still another was the compatibility of British methods. One suspects, for example, that the British phased system of flight instruction and the RFC’s stress on disciplined air tactics appealed more than the French Roleur system and emphasis on individual flying, though both systems were used. And one must also remember the affinity that quickly developed during the war between British air leaders like David Henderson, Lord Tiverton and Hugh Trenchard with Air Service leaders like Benjamin D Foulois, Mason Patrick and Henry H Arnold, not to mention a persistent gadfly who haunted higher military circles named William ‘Billy’ Mitchell.8 The story of US combat aircraft production is well known. The 10 A handful of British-built SE5as flew with Aero Squadrons, during WW I, notably the 25th. Although plans for domestic production had foundered, about 200, like this one, served with the post-war Air Service until 1925. Bolling Mission9 identified British aircraft for production in the United States with a couple of exceptions, notably the Italian Caproni bomber and the French SPAD pursuit. Among the British aircraft selected were the Royal Aircraft Factory SE5a, the Bristol F2B, the Handley Page O/400, and the De Havilland DH 4. This effort turned into a major fiasco, however. Differences between European hand- crafted manufacturing and American assembly line production by unskilled labour hampered the American programme from the beginning. The SE5 programme, for example, was complicated by the arrival of an incomplete sample aircraft from England along with plans and drawings that mixed parts from three different versions of the aircraft. Only one was completed before the programme was cancelled. Likewise, the effort to stuff the massive 400 hp Liberty engine into the frame of the Bristol Fighter failed, and three of the over-powered aircraft crashed killing two crews. This programme was also cancelled. The Handley Page programme was only slightly more successful, complete sub-assemblies for 100 of the huge bombers being shipped to England, although none arrived in time to be assembled and see operational service. Only the DH 4 programme yielded aircraft. Ultimately, some 1,440 Liberty-powered DH 4s reached France, but the airframe was too weak to allow the Liberty to be run at full throttle and the pressurised fuel tank between the pilot and observer gave the aircraft the reputation of being a ‘flamer.’10 In the case of pilots, Americans joined the Royal Flying Corps by several different routes. Many crossed the border into Canada as individuals and found their way into the Royal Flying Corps, which was willing to turn a blind eye to the citizenship of suitable