Piercing the Fog - Air Force Historical Studies Office

Taking the Offensive
recording the locations and characteristics of Japanese radar stations. The ferret
aircraft continued to fly with each bombing mission; they also flew alone to
map Japanese electronic defenses in eastern China and Manchuria, and later in
the home islands. Data from these early recording missions and similar flights
in Burma had considerably broadened Allied understanding of Japanese radar.
The American bomber crews quickly began using their detection equipment to
avoid AA defenses by taking evasive action when their ships came under
observation and fire?3
Maps of AA gun positions prepared by the A-2 supplemented the radar
information. The maps issued to flight crews indicated the locations, types of
guns, their estimated number, and any detected patterns of movement between
locations. Within a short time, the Americans had drawn fairly comprehensive
maps of enemy defenses. This information allowed for flight planning that took
advantage of open areas to reduce the likelihood of detection and the risk of
aircraft damage by Japanese gunfire. At the same time, a flight of B-29
photoreconnaissance aircraft greatly improved target information by mapping
large areas of China, Manchuria, and Korea. To support MacArthur’s drive
through the Philippines and Nimitz’s seizure of Okinawa, the photo B-29s also
covered both Okinawa and L ~zon.~~
By the summer of 1944, Japan’s strategic position no longer seemed as
favorable as it had been a year earlier. In order to capitalize on any apparent
weakness, General Arnold directed committee analysts to review their report
and either validate their original recommendations or create a new target
priority list. In that review, completed on October 10, 1944, the committee
recommended B-29 attacks on the Japanese aircraft industry and urban
industrial areas and, where feasible, their mining of sea lanes. In a disquieting
note, the COA observed that “lack of information remains a major obstacle to
careful target selection.” To correct the problem, it recommended increased
efforts at reconnaissance and other information gathering, such as POW
interrogations and technical analyses of captured documents and eq~ipment.’~
The problem of inadequate knowledge of Japanese target areas was shortly to
assume greater importance.
The COA’s recommendations, and the information gathering and mapping
done by the XX Bomber Command’s intelligence staff, became the basis of
B-29 operations from Chengtu. As a result of his unhappiness over the
performance of the bombers, Arnold fired General Wolfe (who returned to the
States) and replaced him with General LeMay on August 29, 1944. LeMay was
a known perfectionist. He insisted on mission accomplishment, but his demands
conflicted with the very imperfect understanding of enemy targets.’6
In the Pacific, east of China, B-29s of Hansell’s XXI Bomber Command
began landing on Saipan in mid-October 1944, as soon after that island’s
capture as their airfields were ready. When Hansell’s crews arrived, they, like
LeMay’s, found target information poor. Photoreconnaissance of Japan had
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