Piercing the Fog - Air Force Historical Studies Office

Piercing the Fog
Maj. Gen. Henry H. “Hap” Arnold
air bombardment would break the morale of the German people, Hansell argued
for precision attacks, at least injtially. Then, “as German morale begins to crack,
area bombing of civil concentrations may be effective.” Which of the preferred
AWPD-1 target systems might be attacked would depend upon the size of the
available striking force. Bomber attacks would have to penetrate into Germany
for great distances, and escort fighters-as yet undeveloped-would need to
accompany the heavily armed bombers. Finally, Hansell argued against
piecemeal force employment, urging that an air force of significant size be
organized and trained in the United States before deploying to England.’”
Hansell apparently assumed that adequate intelligence existed for the AWD-1
targets and that precise target intelligence would not be necessary for attacks
against what he had termed “civil concentrations.”
The completed AWPD-1 reached the WPD of the WDGS before Arnold
returned from Argentia, Newfoundland, where he had gone with Marshall for
the conversations between President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston
Churchill. The plan had been checked and tacitly approved by Robert A. Lovett,
Assistant Secretary of War for Air. By September 1, both Marshall and
Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson had been told of the plan. They liked its
concept.
The development of AWPD-1, and its almost immediate acceptance by the
Secretary of War and chief of staff of the Army, finally presented air intelli-
gence with the challenge that had been unfolding since the mid-1930s when the
ACTS began to articulate its belief in the decisiveness of strategic air attack
when employed against the industrial web of an adversary. What previously had
been conceptual and notional about targeting now became operational and
specific. To execute AWPD-1, AAF leaders had to determine which targets in
Germany were both vital to her industrial war machine and vulnerable to
strategic air attack. The answers would come from air intelligence, which
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