Piercing the Fog - Air Force Historical Studies Office

Piercing the Fog
General George C. Kenney General Nathan F. Twining
By that term he meant a flyer who understood airplanes, who would take risks,
break the rules when an advantage was to be gained by doing so, and would not
ignore the opportunity if some modest thievery would benefit the man’s
squadron or group. Kenney greatly appreciated someone who could use air
power in bold, unexpected, and successful, ways. Within days of assuming
command of the AAFSWA, Kenney promised MacArthur he would bomb
Rabaul’s airfields with his ramshackle collection of B-17s on the day of the
Allied landing at Lunga Point, Guadalcanal (to keep Japanese aviators away
from the 1st Marine Division and its supporting ships as the men moved
ashore). Kenney carried out his promise, much to MacArthur’s joy and surprise.
That attack on Rabaul marked the first, and rather insignificant, use by Kenney
of intercepted Japanese message traffic. After the raid, Kenney read with
satisfaction the reply of the Japanese commander at Rabaul to a request for help
from the Japanese on Guadalcanal and neighboring Tulagi: the American attack
caused too much disruption at the airfields; there could be no air strikes on the
landing force for some days.’’
George Kenney soon became the dominant AAF commander in the region
(his public stature approached only by that of Maj. Gen. Claire L. Chennault),
and he remained so throughout the war. General Hansell, one of Arnold’s
closest advisors in planning the war’s operations and immensely influential in
organizing the B-29 force, said of Kenney: “He did things with air forces that
left airmen gasping. MacArthur owed much of his brilliant success in the
Southwest Pacific to General Kenney’s imaginative performance.” Kenney,
although he became very close to MacArthur, was not a member of the inner
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