Document created: 13 January 04
Air University Review,
March-April 1972
No matter what the psychological climate at any given moment, people remain fascinated with the spectacle of men at war. Even in periods of strong revulsion against war and militarism, such as the 1920s and 1930s—yes, and the 1970s—the popular appetite for historical, literary, and film depictions of war shows no sign of diminishing. The human dimension of war, particularly in the military leaders, ever excites public attention, curiosity, and inquiry.
The war in Vietnam and publication of the Pentagon Papers have focused public attention on the men who make or influence decisions about war and peace. Once more we are made stunningly aware that the most complex politico-military problems center on man and his relationships to his fellows. To analyze and understand the how and why of what happens in wars is a most difficult kind of study because man is chiefly responsible for all of it.
In a recent study, the author, Allen Andrews, seems not to recognize the true complexity of the task he undertook: to examine the relationship between certain air leaders of World War II and the war they fought.* The seven men he portrays were indeed movers and shakers, and we would do well to look at them more closely and try to understand them better, for we have not dispensed with their kind or the institutions of which they were a part.
*Allen Andrews, The Air Marshals (New York: William Morrow & Company, 1970, $6.95), 299 pages.
This is not a thesis book; rather it is a series of loosely related portrayals. There is no central thesis other than “to enquire of the marshals how efficiently they discharged their commission,” and the closing pages are merely a brief résumé of some of the salient features of the air war. The effort to present the war as a matching of skills between professional leaders does not come off. The author is unable to follow Liddell Hart’s precept that “it is only possible to probe into the mind of a commander through historical examples.” But modern air war on the scale of World War II in Europe is entirely too complex—and the decision-making process too diffused and unknowable—to provide comprehensive insights into the minds of the commanders.
Still, the human dimension is ultimately the deus ex machina of warfare, and we cannot understand war if we simply view it as the play of great impersonal forces in which men are beings without free will. It is important for any society to inquire into what manner of men are those who lead them in warfare. Here we are concerned with some of the men who commanded the great air fleets of World War II in Europe. Of the seven “air marshals” chosen, four were British—Portal, Tedder, Dowding, and Harris; two American—Arnold and Spaatz; and one German—Goering. Actually, Spaatz is almost ignored, and most of the focus is on Goering, Arnold, Portal, and Tedder. The treatment of individuals is uneven in terms of space, depth, and perspective, and only Arnold and Goering, particularly the latter, emerge as personalities. .
Hermann Goering receives the fullest treatment, undoubtedly partly because more has been written about him than the others and because Andrews has chosen to view the German side of the war almost exclusively through his focus on Goering. It would have been more valuable to examine also the role of some of the other German air marshals who actually ran major segments of the air war for substantial periods of time, such men as Kesselring, Jeschonnek, Peltz, Sperrle, and Von Richthofen.
Even though Goering was commander in chief of the Luftwaffe and more responsible than anyone else for the creation and destruction of the Luftwaffe, he was not a professional in the sense that the other air marshals were. He did not exercise long-term direction of strategy or operations as did the others, and when he did step in to take over direction of some air operation he usually did more harm than good to the German cause. Both Goering and the Luftwaffe fell increasingly into disrepute with Hitler, the High Command, and the German army when it became evident that Germany could not escape severe air attack and damage from the Allied bombers. Albert Speer, who had ample opportunity to know and observe Goering during the war, described him as “like a bankrupt who up to the last moment wants to deceive himself along with the creditors.” For a firsthand portrait of Goering the unscrupulous schemer in action, it is more rewarding to read Speer’s Inside the Third Reich.
Hap Arnold is known to Andrews chiefly from Arnold’s own book, Global Mission. There must be some suspicion that Arnold receives as much attention as he does in order to give some balance to a book that is written by a Briton chiefly about Britons. Andrews accepts the book’s version of Arnold and events at face value without any attempt at critical analysis from internal evidence. Thus the treatment of Arnold tends to exaggerate his role in the strategy and direction of the air war. His invaluable and dedicated contribution to the building of the U.S. Army Air Forces comes through clearly, but his role in the air war in Europe—exercised remotely, chiefly through Spaatz—does not.
Unfortunately there is no full-scale biography of Air Chief Marshal Sir Charles F. A. Portal. This is regrettable because Andrews is unable to present a meaningful portrait of this great war leader, although he tries to give him his due, which was very great indeed. Of all the British chiefs of staff, he was the most trusted and respected and the best liked by American leaders. As Chief of the Air Staff of the Royal Air Force from 1940 through 1945, his physical proximity to the fighting forces and the theater of operations afforded him an opportunity for daily firsthand observation and familiarity with the air war that was denied Arnold. Through most of the war, Portal was the central figure in the formulation and direction of Anglo-American air strategy, a prime mover in initiating and prosecuting the air offensive against Germany.
Sir Arthur Tedder, who did write a good book about his war experiences—With Prejudice—is disposed of by Andrews, with some generalities about the importance of his role, in a few pages towards the end of the book. Indeed, the last year of hostilities, when Tedder exercised a great deal of influence on the course and direction of the whole air war, both strategic and tactical, is disposed of in little more than twenty pages. Tedder deserves most of the credit for securing the adoption in 1944 of the plan for the bombing of the French and Belgian railways in the period immediately preceding the Normandy landing: he persisted and prevailed in the face of opposition from Churchill and the British War Cabinet. He deserves to be included at the top of any listing of air leaders of World War II. In this book he is insufficiently celebrated.
Sir Hugh Dowding and Sir Arthur Harris, both air chief marshals, are presented on an even smaller stage, despite their being central figures in momentous events—the Battle of Britain and the air offensive against Germany. They were men of vision, if not visionaries, but neither received a full measure of recognition from the nation they had served. Dowding became the victim of intraservice politics, and Harris of higher politics. By the end of the war, Churchill had lost his enthusiasm for RAF Bomber Command’s campaign against German cities, and “Bomber” Harris was permitted to fade quietly away. Still, for nearly four years Harris was a powerful and aggressive principal in the shaping and conduct of the air war in Europe. Dowding’s time at stage center was much briefer but no less significant.
Andrews is clearly uninformed about Spaatz’s stature and the significant part he played in planning and directing the air war against the European Axis between 1942 and 1945, perhaps because there is no biography and Spaatz has never published his memoirs. As the major American air commander in Europe during these years, he was indeed Arnold’s alter ego, had Arnold’s complete confidence, and exercised a degree of initiative exceeding that of any other overseas American air commander during the war. He was the peer of Portal, Tedder, and Harris in the European Theater and had a sound working relationship with them, especially Tedder, with whom he had previously worked closely in the Mediterranean Theater for more than a year.
Contrary to the allegations of some historians and observers of the war in Europe, Spaatz was fully aware of and genuinely responsive to the needs of the ground forces in the OVERLORD campaign. Once the major decisions were taken, he cooperated effectively with Eisenhower and Tedder in making the American strategic air forces, both bombers and fighters, available for air operations in support of the ground campaigns. For more than two months before D-Day on 6 June 1944, the American heavy bombers participated in the bombing campaign against the French and Belgian railroad systems and other targets in preparation for the landings. For three months or more after D-Day the heavy bombers continued to devote most of their efforts to support of the ground forces, flying tens of thousands of sorties in interdiction and close air support operations. This enormous effort was, of course, at the expense of the bombardment of strategic targets in Germany.
Spaatz strongly defended this diversion of the bomber effort against critics, including some of his own subordinates, who regarded it as unjustified and unnecessary. In spite of the urgings and pressures of some of his own commanders and staff officers, Spaatz persisted in regarding all of the U.S. air forces in Europe, including the strategic bombers, as part of the overall resources that had to be available to the Supreme Allied Commander, General Eisenhower. Unlike Harris, a prima donna who initially opposed and then reluctantly permitted RAF Bomber Command to participate in the OVERLORD campaign, Spaatz was a team player. He had independent views and judgments and fought for them, but he did not permit service interests, parochialism, or personal preferences to obscure the larger objectives. All this should be part of any portrayal of Spaatz.
Unfortunately, Andrews offers nothing new about the history of the air war between 1939 and 1945. His book is based almost entirely on secondary sources, and not all of these are the best that were available. The 39 works cited in the book are really too skimpy a list to enable more than a superficial exposition and appraisal of the six years of air war in Europe. Many of these books are purely reference works or tangential to the subject, touching on the air war only minimally: for instance, Keering’s Contemporary Archives, G. M. Gilbert’s Nuremberg Diary, and Douglas M. Kelly’s 22 Cells in Nuremberg and Anschluss Transactions. Only about half the works are primarily concerned with the air war. More than 40 percent of the 153 footnotes are from three sources: Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air Offensive against Germany 1939-1945; Winston Churchill, The Second World War; and Henry H. Arnold, Global Mission, and it is likely that Andrews is even more indebted to these three works than the footnotes indicate. It is perhaps equally significant that Andrews failed to use some of the most important basic works bearing on the subject, including the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey and the British Bombing Mission Survey.
The proportions of the book are uneven in its coverage of the war. About half is devoted to the prewar years and the first year of the war—the Polish and French campaigns and the Battle of Britain. The 1942-1945 period is covered in 55 pages, including the British and American strategic bombing campaigns and OVERLORD. Thus the air war is viewed only partially and selectively, and the selection does not seem to be consistent or systematic. The chief criterion appears to have been the ready availability of sources that could provide some accounts linking one air marshal or another with places or event of the air war. In short, the author is too much the prisoner of his sources, and the result is an erratic, disproportionate, inadequate work.
All these strictures on sources, proportions, handling of material, and quality of documentation are in accord with other aspects of the book, leading to the conclusion that it does not make a serious contribution to either history or biography. It is, rather, an interesting popular account of some of the leaders and highlights of the air war in Western Europe. I hope the future will produce a work worthy of the theme.
Arlington, Virginia
Dr. Alfred Goldberg (Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University) is a senior staff member of the RAND Corporation, Washington D.C. He was formerly Chief of the Current History Branch of the USAF Historical Division. He has lectured at the Universities of Maryland, Southern California, and UCLA. He was editor of A History of the U.S. Air Force, 1907-1957 and coauthor of The Army Air Forces in World War II. In 1962-63 he was a visiting fellow at Kings College, London.
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environment of Air University. They do not reflect the official position of the
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