Piercing the Fog - Air Force Historical Studies Office

Taking the Offensive
a problem that he often could not have ordered his men to fly no matter how
lucrative a target the intelligence people f0und.3~
The enormous Japanese presence on the Chinese mainland offered a
plethora of tactical and strategic strike opportunities. The Japanese military had
operated in China for years; they had airfields in abundance, and as they laid out
new ones, word of their locations filtered back to Kunming through various
channels. Harbors and shipping facilities were always available to strike, as
were Japanese troop dispositions, supply columns, and barracks. In the last half
of 1942 and in early 1943, Chennault’s problem lay in sorting out the best
targets. The old AVG, which formed the small cadre that became the Four-
teenth, had been an air defense force, using P-40~ largely to shoot down
Japanese aircraft. In the fall of 1942, the newly formed AAF contingent began
to receive B-25 medium bombers and increase the use of P-40~ as dive
bombers. Both of its new activites required better and faster intelligence
analysis, but enhancing support services in this far comer of the world took
time. Chennault’s staff grew slowly, and his A-2 office suffered from severe
shortages of qualified specialist^.^^
Late in 1942, Chennault’s A-2, Colonel Cooper, left China for home and
medical treatment. At about the same time, Cooper’s assistant, Lieutenant
Hubler, departed also. Only Lieutenant Birch was left to fill target and combat
intelligence tasks. One other officer, 1st Lt. Gerald E. Reed, worked in security
and counterintelligence, at that time a normal part of an A-2 office in the AAF.
These two officers constituted the entire CATF intelligence staff until a new
contingent arrived from the United States to form a team that would operate
Fourteenth Air Force’s intelligence section for most of the remainder of the war.
At year’s end, Lt. Col. Jesse C. Williams became Assistant Chief of Staff, A-2,
and Capt. Wilfred J. Smith assisted Williams and worked on operational
intelligence and objective folders. (Smith later commanded the AGFRTS, the
unit that gathered information in the field, directed close air support and air
attacks deep into Japanese-held territory, rescued downed airmen, and carried
out demolitions and radio direction finding.) Capt. Richard Taylor prepared
situation maps and wrote intelligence summaries and extracts. Capt. Morgan B.
O’Connor began the AAF photointerpretation work in China, relying on
pictures taken by four F-4 aircraft that had arrived in November 1942.* In
1943, 1st Lt. Carl G. Nelson arrived from Washington as a qualified technical
intelligence officer to track down enemy war equipment. Four enlisted
men-corporals Nelson, Okerberg, and Varey, and Private Amegard-typed,
drafted reports, and created charts and graphs. In January 1943, Chennault
sought formal authorizations for his existing intelligence staff plus two more
intelligence officers for each fighter group and bomber group; two for each
combat flying squadron to perform briefing, interrogation, and liaison; and two
*The F-4 was a P-38 stripped of guns and modified for photography.
313