Remembering the 8th Air Force

Untold sacrifices to save civilians

A brutally accusatory headline in a local weekly newspaper a few weeks ago was called to my attention by an outraged friend of mine who is a practicing Quaker. Initiating a success story of a local individual who was fortunate enough to have escaped war-ravaged Europe as a young girl to benefit from the opportunity and largess of postwar USA, were the words “Dad Killed by American Bombs.”. What kind of America-hating revisionist thinking would put a statement of that type as the prelude to the life story of someone who benefitted directly and immensely from what this country did to save Europe from itself — again; from 1941-1945?

No single military unit in the history of this country lost more men in combat than the 8th Air Force that flew bombers from England beginning in 1942. In fact June 4th of this year will mark the 70th Anniversary of that unit’s first mission over Europe in borrowed British planes; as their B-17s did not arrive until August. Six took off, four returned. Sadly, that first mission was a prelude of things to come for this unit that sent 110,000 pilots and crew members to stop the Nazi menace that took France and most of Europe with ease, and left behind 56,000 of them; a staggering 51% loss ratio — considerably higher than even those Marines that died in hand to hand combat in the Pacific fighting Japanese who were sworn to never surrender.  In point of fact, the 8th Air Force fighting from England lost more total men than all those Navy and Marine forces that fought in World War II in the entire Pacific War —51,900.

The reason that the losses were so high was basic.  This country decided that we would bomb the entrenched Germans in France, Germany and Italy in the daytime only. Using the technology of that time, flying low enough for visibility, we would then use our just-developed “Norden Bombsight” to bomb only those military and strategic targets and do our very best to avoid civilian areas. While the British and others would only do indiscriminate night bombing to escape the German fighter planes and ground gun emplacements who could easily hit them, we sent unescorted slow “sitting ducks” for the excellent German Luftwaffe. Some renamed the B-17 from the Flying Fortress to the “Flying Coffin”. Some missions had 30-40% of the planes shot down — but we continued to do it anyway for a grand total of 2,609 missions.  Unescorted means that our fighter plans that could have knocked out the German ones were not with the bombers, as none of them at the time had fuel capability to go that far and get back.

Our military regulations for bomber crews at the start of the war required that they perform 25 missions before they could return home to the states. Losses were averaging 5% per mission, and they flew only on good weather days for maximum visibility (Of course that visibility worked both ways).  It was a statistical impossibility for a crew member to live a full month once he arrived, for once they made 20 of the 25 missions, 100% were presumably lost.

Later in the war they raised the required number to 30 and then 35 missions.  By that time we had developed P-47 and P-51 fighter planes that could stay with the bombers and protect them.  Also, the German Luftwaffe was become decimated and no where near as effective.

Most of the pilots were in their early 20s, the same for the bombardiers and navigators.  The gunners on board these planes could have been as young as 17. They knew the day they arrived that it was likely the last month of their life, but the French civilians particularly benefitted by what we called “precision bombing”.

In the 1950s a well-done black and white film named “12 O’Clock High” summarized what I have outlined.  I recommend it be seen by every American.

I started grammar school right after the war. At that time many of the boys carried their books in the knapsacks that our fathers brought back from the war with “U.S.” stamped clearly on the flap. When one wore out you could buy another for pennies at the “Army-Navy” stores all over the city. We also traded insignia patches from the uniforms our fathers/uncles had; as almost every family had someone who served. These would then be sewn on the knapsack or your jacket.

I had a patch from the 8th Air Force, but it was the hardest of all the Air Force ones to find — now I know why.  Someone in the neighborhood made it back.

Jim Foster

Editor/Publisher

Germantown Newspapers Inc.

editor@germantownnewspapers.com