Piercing the Fog - Air Force Historical Studies Office

Piercing the Fog
During 1934-1935, the British government accepted the theory that in a
future war Germany might try to score a quick victory by a large-scale
devastating air attack. The Air Staff estimated that casualties on the order of
20,000 might be expected in London within the first 24 hours of aerial
bombardment; within a week these might rise to 150,000. A seeming British
fear of aerial bombing had been apparent to authorities in Nazi Germany as
early as 1934, and it became the substance for a diplomacy that might be
characterized as Lufpolitik. Paralyzed by the prospect of German war, Great
Britain and France abandoned Czechoslovakia to Adolf Hitler in the Munich
appeasement pact on September 30, 193KB7 In General Arnold’s words,
“Without firing a shot, dropping a bomb, or even starting an engine, Hitler’s
Luftwaffe and his armored forces won for him his first major victory of World
war II.”Rx
Some historians have believed that the Munich agreement saved Great
Britain by providing a year in which to prepare for the Luftwufse. More recent
scholars argue that British military intelligence failed the government at a
critical juncture. The Luftwaffe, they stress, was grossly unprepared for a two-
front war in September 1938, and preparations for an air offensive against Great
Britain were “totally inadequate” because the GAF had “tied its plans for both
1938 and 1939 closely to the operations of the army’’ rather than planning for
strategic operations.89
In the United States, President Franklin D. Roosevelt had listened to men,
such as Ambassadors Hugh Wilson in Berlin and William C. Bullitt in Paris,
who agreed that Hitler’s power rested on an already large air force capable of
rapid expansion from existing airplane factories. Ruminating on the inadequate
reports from Wilson and Bullitt, Roosevelt reached a conclusion that immedi-
ately benefited the Air Corps. At a meeting on November 14, 1938, the
President “issued instructions which General Arnold described as the ‘Magna
Carta’ of the Air Force. Roosevelt announced that airplanes-not ground
forces-were the implements of war which would have an influence on Hitler’s
actions.” He wanted vastly increased U.S. aircraft production and preparations
“to resist [an Axis] assault on the Western Hemisphere ‘from the North to the
South Pole.””
Increased support for the Air Corps within the War Department found
manifestation in many ways, not the least of which was the appointment of Brig.
Gen. George C. Marshall as Deputy Chief of Staff in the summer of 1938.
Subsequently, Marshall, who became Acting Chief of Staff in July of 1939 and
Chief of Staff the following September, foresaw a much broader use for air
power than his predecessor did. When the question of the Army Air Corps’
mission was raised again, it was resolved in a definitive statement approved on
September 15, 1939. This War Department Air Board report declared, “Air
Power is indispensable to our national defense, especially in the early stages of
war. Our aviation in peacetime, both its organization and its equipment, must
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