In the early sixties I was assigned to the Air Force War Plans Division in the Pentagon and regularly briefed General LeMay, then the chief of staff. Along with most of the briefing officers, I was in awe of the general and much relieved each time I escaped unscathed from another briefing.
In June 1990, General LeMay lectured on strategic bombing at the National Air and Space Museum. In that lecture he said that the only two Americans who could speak with authority on successful strategic bombing campaigns were Gen. Jimmy Doolittle and himself, and since he was the youngest, at 83, he was delivering the lecture.
He spoke with visible emotion on the great disparity in the results of the bombing efforts against Japan and against North Vietnam. In Japan, the 500,000 tons of bombs that were dropped brought Japan to the point of surrender, and he was convinced that the surrender would have come within a few months, even without the atomic bombs. In Vietnam some 6.5 million tons of bombs were dropped without any decisive effect. The crucial difference was target selection: the Japanese targets were selected by the military commanders on the scene, but the Vietnamese targets were selected by civilians in Washington with little or no military experience.
At a small dinner preceding the lecture I saw another side of General LeMay. When the bread was served, one of the guests who knew him well mentioned that General LeMay baked fresh bread nearly every day. Since I too bake bread regularly we got into a discussion on various types of bread. He asked if I baked French bread, and if so, did I spray it every five minutes during its baking. When I said that I did, he asked what I used as a sprayer. I said, "I use an old Windex bottle." He smiled and said, "So do I." Sadly, that lecture was his last public appearance. He suffered a heart attack and died in September of that year.
On August 6, 1945, the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, and on August 9 a second hit Nagasaki. Although it was difficult to comprehend how a single bomb could have the destructive power of some 20,000 tons of TNT, we realized that no country, however fanatical, could stand up to that kind of destruction. We didn't realize it at the time, but a whole new era, the atomic age, had begun. An all-out nuclear war could not only win a war but also destroy both sides, if not all life on Earth. A new vocabulary, previously used only by scientists, came into being. Words like "fission," "fusion," "radioactivity," ''gamma ray," and "megadeath" became common.
At Eglin, life went on as usual until the night of August 15, when, in the middle of a party at the beach club, our group commander was called to the phone. Upon concluding the conversation, he asked for our attention and announced, "Japan has surrendered. The war is over!" After a brief, stunned silence, the cheering and hilarity began. Lieutenants were pouring drinks on majors; people were singing and kissing and toasting and drinking and drinking. Although I had never felt there was a good enough reason to take a drink before or during the war, this occasion seemed to warrant one. At the urging of many friends I filled a tumbler with bourbon and drank it using a borrowed brier pipe as a straw. It made me, and several of the observers, sick. To date I have never found an event worthy of another drink. Although we believed the news, it was several days before the reality sank in that the killing had ended, and we had not only won but also survived the war.
The war had lasted almost six years. Millions, a shocking two thirds of them helpless civilians, had been killed or maimed. Thousands of square miles of territory had been devastated, including magnificent cities, cathedrals, and monuments that had survived for centuries. The ocean bottoms were littered with shattered ships, submarines, airplanes, and the bones of their crews. Mankind hoped that the atomic bomb would make future wars impossible. It was not to be, but so far at least, it has been a deterrent to world wars.
3
Tigercat Performance
At first, nothing much changed with the ending of the war. The great war machine that the United States had forged in the last few years had too much momentum to stop instantly. The production miracle that had armed the U.S. troops, along with most of the Allies as well, would have to make a transition to peacetime production. There was a great demand for all types of civilian goods, since their production had practically ceased during the war. Automobiles, tires, large and small appliances, and many other so-called necessities were unobtainable and would remain so until the factories could make the transition.
The armed services, too, would have to return to peacetime status, which would entail a great reduction in manpower and equipment. The government planned to carry out this reduction in an orderly manner, keeping enough troops to meet our occupation requirements in Europe and Asia with a large enough establishment in the ZI (Zone of the Interior — which is what the Army, for some reason, calls the United States) to support the overseas troops. At the time we thought that the occupation would be relatively short-lived. I'm sure no one had any idea that almost fifty years later we would still maintain large forces in the countries of our allies and former enemies Germany and Japan.
The United States, however, had no strong tradition of peacetime military service, and within a month of the surrender, members of Congress were besieged with letters urging them to bring the boys home and get them out of service so they could take up their lives where they had left off.
Sadly, there were many homes to which the boys would never return. The government was forced to release all the eligible servicemen and — women just as fast as they could be processed. Eligibility was determined by a system of points awarded for total service, overseas service, combat, wounds, and decorations. Because of congressional pressure the number of points required for discharge was steadily reduced. By the end of 1945 entire units had been dissolved and the military services had been depleted almost to the point of becoming nonfunctional. It took about a year for the remaining units to regain full strength.
Many of the officers and the majority of the enlisted personnel left the service as soon as possible to return to college or to resume their previous careers. A major factor that influenced the rapid exodus from the service was the G.I. Bill of Rights, passed by the Congress and signed into law by President Franklin Roosevelt on June 22, 1944. In addition to low-cost loans for homes and businesses and unemployment benefits, it provided discharged servicemen with subsistence and tuition for higher education and other approved training for a period equal to the time spent in service plus twelve months. Some seven million veterans took advantage of either the education or training assistance, to the great benefit of the veterans and the country. The education benefits especially allowed many thousands of veterans whose prewar circumstances could never have financed a college education to enter the professions and achieve goals that would have been beyond their reach otherwise.
My squadron was left with only the career enlisted men and a few short-time draftees to perform the aircraft maintenance and other vital squadron functions. Fortunately, we had some outstanding master and tech sergeants who by great effort allowed us to maintain our test flying schedules at almost the same level as during the war.