WEBVTT - The Bomber Mafia 0:00:15.356 --> 0:00:15.796 Pushkin. 0:00:20.356 --> 0:00:24.276 Everything about Curtis Emerson. Le May begins with his love 0:00:24.276 --> 0:00:30.076 of airplanes in his memoirs, which are otherwise written in plain, 0:00:30.316 --> 0:00:37.036 straight ahead prose. There's one moment of pure poetry. Suddenly 0:00:37.276 --> 0:00:41.996 in the air above me appeared a flying machine. It 0:00:42.076 --> 0:00:46.396 came from nowhere. There it was, and I wanted to 0:00:46.436 --> 0:00:50.956 catch it. It was nineteen ten. Le May was five. 0:00:51.316 --> 0:00:53.716 He was in the backyard of the struggling neighborhood where 0:00:53.756 --> 0:00:58.196 his family lived in Columbus, Ohio. He goes on, children 0:00:58.276 --> 0:01:02.236 can muster enormous strength in ideal and idea in all 0:01:02.316 --> 0:01:06.196 their effort to grasp the trophy they desire. And nobody 0:01:06.276 --> 0:01:10.356 was holding me back. No one was standing close to say, Look, 0:01:10.436 --> 0:01:13.756 you're just a little child. That airplane is away up 0:01:13.796 --> 0:01:16.196 there in the air, and no matter how fast you run, 0:01:16.236 --> 0:01:18.676 you can't keep up with it. You can't reach high 0:01:18.756 --> 0:01:21.796 enough to seize it. I just thought that I might 0:01:21.836 --> 0:01:24.636 be able to grab the airplane and have it for 0:01:24.756 --> 0:01:28.916 my own and possess it always. So I lit out 0:01:28.956 --> 0:01:35.916 after it. Little Curtis ran across neighbors, backyards, vacant lots, 0:01:36.236 --> 0:01:43.676 down sidewalks, then it was gone. It's wonderful sound and force, 0:01:44.036 --> 0:01:47.676 and the freakish illusion of the thing, a thing made 0:01:47.716 --> 0:01:52.596 of wood and metal, piercing the air. He went back 0:01:52.596 --> 0:01:59.756 home and he wept. Reading that made me think, oddly enough, 0:02:00.036 --> 0:02:02.876 of something I wrote years ago about Wayne Gretzky, the 0:02:02.916 --> 0:02:06.756 greatest hockey player of all time. His parents remember that 0:02:06.836 --> 0:02:09.756 when he was not yet two years old, long before 0:02:09.796 --> 0:02:12.276 he knew much about the game of hockey, Wayne would 0:02:12.316 --> 0:02:14.876 sit right in front of the television when a hockey 0:02:14.876 --> 0:02:22.476 game was on. He was enraptured, and then he would 0:02:22.516 --> 0:02:26.996 cry and cry uncontrollably when the match was over, because 0:02:27.036 --> 0:02:30.676 he could not understand how something so sublime should have 0:02:30.756 --> 0:02:34.636 to come to an end. That's Curtis le May running 0:02:34.676 --> 0:02:37.996 after the flying machine in the sky. Something about that 0:02:38.036 --> 0:02:42.756 particular object, that act of flying, perfectly fit the contours 0:02:42.796 --> 0:02:47.356 of his imagination, and from that point on, the airplane 0:02:48.036 --> 0:02:54.476 was everything. My name is Malcolm Glapwell. You're listening to 0:02:54.596 --> 0:03:00.156 Revisionist History, my podcast about things overlooked and misunderstood. Over 0:03:00.196 --> 0:03:03.396 the next four episodes, I'm going to tell the story 0:03:03.676 --> 0:03:06.156 of Curtis le May and what he did on a 0:03:06.236 --> 0:03:13.556 cold night in March of nineteen forty five. This is 0:03:13.596 --> 0:03:17.076 a love story about what happens when someone falls head 0:03:17.076 --> 0:03:20.716 over heels for a magnificent piece of machinery and a 0:03:20.756 --> 0:03:25.476 brilliant bit of technology, and what happens when that love 0:03:25.596 --> 0:03:33.316 starts to cloud every other human consideration. The events I'm 0:03:33.316 --> 0:03:36.036 going to talk about all took place a lifetime ago, 0:03:36.396 --> 0:03:38.876 at the end of the Second World War, but everything 0:03:38.916 --> 0:03:42.436 about le May's story seems very modern to me, Mostly 0:03:42.476 --> 0:03:46.116 because everything about lem May seems very modern. I think 0:03:46.156 --> 0:03:48.676 that's why I've decided to devote so much of this 0:03:48.796 --> 0:03:52.796 season to him. It feels like he started something that 0:03:52.836 --> 0:03:58.876 we're still in the middle of. Le May was a bulldog, 0:03:59.396 --> 0:04:03.636 thick through the chest, oversized, square head, hair parted triumphantly, 0:04:03.836 --> 0:04:07.156 just a shade off the middle, A brilliant poker player, 0:04:07.196 --> 0:04:11.756 a crack shot. He was an innovator, utterly without fear, 0:04:12.076 --> 0:04:17.396 a mind that moved only forwards, never sideways, rational and imperturbable, 0:04:17.716 --> 0:04:22.156 and incapable of self doubt. Were he alive today, he 0:04:22.156 --> 0:04:25.876 would be in command of some high tech powerhouse, crushing 0:04:26.156 --> 0:04:33.476 all competition, seizing the future. I find myself sometimes falling 0:04:33.516 --> 0:04:37.196 for Curtis le May because of his many gifts, his 0:04:37.356 --> 0:04:40.796 logic and rigor and commitment and resolve in the face 0:04:40.836 --> 0:04:43.476 of the longest of odds seem like things we need 0:04:43.516 --> 0:04:47.636 more of right now, not less. There is a chance 0:04:48.196 --> 0:04:51.716 you will fall for him too. And all I can 0:04:51.756 --> 0:04:54.916 say is that if you do, try to remember the 0:04:54.916 --> 0:04:58.116 following fact. If you make a list of the people 0:04:58.196 --> 0:05:01.516 responsible for the most civilian deaths in the twentieth century, 0:05:01.996 --> 0:05:05.756 at the top are Stalin and Mao, and Paul Pott 0:05:05.956 --> 0:05:12.036 and Hitler. The familiar names not too far behind, uncomfortably 0:05:12.076 --> 0:05:15.596 close behind, is Curtis Emerson, lament. 0:05:21.516 --> 0:05:23.476 Or as a mini national business. And you want to 0:05:23.556 --> 0:05:26.436 kill a lot of people, no way of getting around it, 0:05:27.676 --> 0:05:33.676 I mean moral commander tries or minimize as sam possible. 0:05:33.876 --> 0:05:36.356 For me, the best way of minimizing as getting a 0:05:36.356 --> 0:05:38.036 war over as quite as possible. 0:05:39.756 --> 0:05:42.596 In its earliest days, the US Air Force was not 0:05:42.636 --> 0:05:45.996 a separate branch of the military. That wouldn't happen until 0:05:46.036 --> 0:05:49.316 after the Second World War. Back in the nineteen thirties, 0:05:49.596 --> 0:05:52.436 the Air Corps, as it was known, was a combat 0:05:52.476 --> 0:05:55.916 division of the army. It existed to serve the interests 0:05:55.916 --> 0:06:00.476 of the ground forces, to support assist a company. The 0:06:00.596 --> 0:06:04.676 legendary Army General John Blackjack Pershing, who commanded the American 0:06:04.716 --> 0:06:08.196 forces in World War One, once set of airpower that quote, 0:06:08.476 --> 0:06:11.596 it can of its own account, neither win a war 0:06:11.676 --> 0:06:14.356 at the present time, nor, as far as we can tell, 0:06:14.516 --> 0:06:17.556 at any time in the future. That's what the military 0:06:17.636 --> 0:06:21.516 establishment thought of airplanes. But in the years between the 0:06:21.556 --> 0:06:24.996 World Wars, a small group of airmen began to challenge 0:06:24.996 --> 0:06:28.276 the idea that airplanes were superfluous to winning a war. 0:06:28.916 --> 0:06:32.716 The group was centered at Maxwell Airfield in Montgomery, Alabama, 0:06:33.036 --> 0:06:38.276 at what was called the Air Corps Tactical School. Everyone 0:06:38.316 --> 0:06:40.676 in this group had once been that little boy who 0:06:40.716 --> 0:06:44.156 spotted a plane in the sky and ran after it blindly. 0:06:44.876 --> 0:06:48.276 They were in love with planes. They gave themselves a motto, 0:06:48.796 --> 0:06:54.916 proficamus morey irritanti, We make progress unhindered by custom. They 0:06:54.956 --> 0:06:59.156 thought that technological advances in aviation were about to revolutionize 0:06:59.156 --> 0:07:02.916 warfare forever. And they weren't talking about fighter planes, the 0:07:03.036 --> 0:07:06.956 romantic daredevil pilots who engaged in dog fights with the enemy. 0:07:07.196 --> 0:07:10.156 They had disdained for small planes. They were in love 0:07:10.196 --> 0:07:13.476 with bombers. They looked across the ocean at Europe and 0:07:13.516 --> 0:07:16.476 the threatening noises being made by Germany. And they said 0:07:16.716 --> 0:07:19.836 a fleet of long range, high flying bombers could do 0:07:19.916 --> 0:07:22.796 so much damage and would be so difficult to defend 0:07:22.836 --> 0:07:25.716 against that the Air Corps could win a war all 0:07:25.756 --> 0:07:30.276 by itself. The group of insurgent pilots at the Air 0:07:30.276 --> 0:07:33.876 Corps Tactical School were known as the Bomber Mafia. 0:07:35.356 --> 0:07:38.756 They were a group of individuals coming together to construct 0:07:38.836 --> 0:07:43.316 ideas about applying the technology of bombing at the day 0:07:44.036 --> 0:07:47.596 in order to win a war against Germany. 0:07:48.036 --> 0:07:50.916 That's the historian Robert Pape who wrote a book called 0:07:50.956 --> 0:07:53.676 Bombing to Win about the origins of many of the 0:07:53.716 --> 0:07:57.236 ideas taught at the Air Corps school. The Bomber Mafia 0:07:57.276 --> 0:08:01.836 gave lectures to select groups of officers arguing theorizing and. 0:08:01.796 --> 0:08:05.196 They are not really investigating the psychology of bombing. They're 0:08:05.236 --> 0:08:08.316 not investigating the sociology of bombing. They're not really even 0:08:08.316 --> 0:08:12.196 investigating the politics of the bombing, that is, the implications 0:08:12.196 --> 0:08:17.276 the bombing would have for population, societies and for governments. 0:08:17.876 --> 0:08:21.876 What they're really doing is focusing on what the technology 0:08:21.916 --> 0:08:24.756 of the bombing of the time, what target sets it 0:08:24.796 --> 0:08:26.836 would allow the bombers to hit. 0:08:27.396 --> 0:08:30.436 In one of the most famous Tactical School lectures. Major 0:08:30.556 --> 0:08:34.236 Muir Fairchild gave a two day presentation in April of 0:08:34.316 --> 0:08:37.516 nineteen thirty nine on what a single bombing attack on 0:08:37.636 --> 0:08:40.276 New York City could do to America's will to fight. 0:08:41.316 --> 0:08:44.916 Fairchild was a charter member of the Bomber Mafia. He 0:08:44.956 --> 0:08:47.156 would later rise to number two in the Air Force. 0:08:47.796 --> 0:08:51.316 He says, imagine that Germany and the United States are 0:08:51.316 --> 0:08:53.396 in the midst of a brutal land war in Europe. 0:08:54.076 --> 0:08:57.236 Germany decides to take out New York Could they do it? 0:08:57.996 --> 0:09:02.596 Fairchild says, easy. Wait, so they have a kind of 0:09:02.676 --> 0:09:05.836 hypothetical scenario, and do they imagine that a group of 0:09:05.836 --> 0:09:08.796 well equipped bombers could bring the United States, or at 0:09:08.876 --> 0:09:10.956 least New York City to its knees in an event 0:09:10.996 --> 0:09:11.956 of any kind of conflict. 0:09:12.516 --> 0:09:17.276 Yeah. Absolutely. The bombing that they're focusing on are number one, 0:09:17.676 --> 0:09:22.196 the bridges. Number two, they have the bombing of the aqueducts. 0:09:22.516 --> 0:09:25.196 The bombing of the aqueducts is important because what they 0:09:25.196 --> 0:09:27.756 want to do is they want to cause massive thirst 0:09:27.956 --> 0:09:31.476 in the New York population. They basically want to create 0:09:31.516 --> 0:09:34.796 a situation where there's almost no potable water for the 0:09:34.836 --> 0:09:39.996 population to drink, and then number three, they target electric power. 0:09:40.756 --> 0:09:44.156 In his lecture, Major Fairchild argues that the aqueducts are 0:09:44.196 --> 0:09:47.316 the most obvious of targets. Then there's the power grid. 0:09:47.716 --> 0:09:51.196 Fairchild directs his students to a chart the aerial bomb 0:09:51.316 --> 0:09:54.956 versus traction electric power in the New York City area. 0:09:55.796 --> 0:09:56.236 Quote. 0:09:56.636 --> 0:09:59.636 We then see that seventeen bombs, if dropped on the 0:09:59.716 --> 0:10:02.916 right spots, will not only take out practically all of 0:10:02.956 --> 0:10:07.036 the electric power of the entire metropolitan area, but will 0:10:07.076 --> 0:10:13.556 prevent the distribution of outside power. Seventeen bombs could bring 0:10:13.556 --> 0:10:16.356 the most important city in the world to its knees. 0:10:16.836 --> 0:10:18.756 The old idea was that you would just bomb the 0:10:18.756 --> 0:10:21.716 whole city, reduce it to rubble with wave upon wave 0:10:21.756 --> 0:10:26.076 of costly and dangerous bombing attacks. Fairchild's point was, why 0:10:26.076 --> 0:10:28.636 would you do that. If you could use your intelligence 0:10:28.956 --> 0:10:32.036 and the best of modern technology to disable the city 0:10:32.076 --> 0:10:34.436 with a single surgical strike. 0:10:35.236 --> 0:10:40.596 You would put amazing stress on the quote will of 0:10:40.636 --> 0:10:44.956 the enemy, meaning the civilian population, which was already under stress. 0:10:45.516 --> 0:10:48.876 And then they just led to the conclusion that the 0:10:48.916 --> 0:10:52.596 civilians would crack and demand an end to the war. 0:10:54.076 --> 0:10:56.116 Are they really thinking of the air force? In this 0:10:57.516 --> 0:11:01.276 thinking and this teaching as the primary arm of the 0:11:01.316 --> 0:11:03.196 American military in this kind of conflict. 0:11:03.316 --> 0:11:06.916 They're certainly thinking that the bomber alone or airpower alone 0:11:06.956 --> 0:11:09.116 is going to win the war. And what they're thinking 0:11:09.236 --> 0:11:12.316 king is that it's going to win the war and 0:11:12.476 --> 0:11:17.316 prevent mass carnage like occurred in World War One, where 0:11:17.356 --> 0:11:20.636 the armies clashed together year after year after year, and 0:11:20.796 --> 0:11:23.636 millions and millions of people died in the meat grinder 0:11:23.836 --> 0:11:26.156 of the trenches in World War One. 0:11:26.196 --> 0:11:29.116 For thousands of years, wars had been about armies of 0:11:29.196 --> 0:11:31.756 men fighting more or less in hand to hand combat 0:11:32.116 --> 0:11:35.516 on fields of battle. The bomb ro mafia believe that 0:11:35.636 --> 0:11:39.036 bombs carried by airplanes were about to make the armies 0:11:39.036 --> 0:11:43.556 of men obsolete. The Air Corps Tactical School was never 0:11:43.676 --> 0:11:47.436 very large. In twenty years of existence, it produced just 0:11:47.516 --> 0:11:52.316 over one thousand graduates, but it was enormously influential. Of 0:11:52.356 --> 0:11:55.076 the three hundred and twenty Air Force generals on duty 0:11:55.076 --> 0:11:57.636 at the end of World War II, two hundred and 0:11:57.636 --> 0:12:01.036 sixty one came out of the Tactical School, and one 0:12:01.036 --> 0:12:08.116 of those graduates was Curtis Emerson LeMay. Only a handful 0:12:08.156 --> 0:12:11.876 of American military leaders in the twentieth century achieved real 0:12:11.996 --> 0:12:15.956 public stature Douglas MacArthur, of course, with his corn caught 0:12:16.036 --> 0:12:20.636 pipe and limitless charisma, Dwight Eisenhower because he commanded the 0:12:20.636 --> 0:12:23.156 Allied war effort in World War II, and in more 0:12:23.196 --> 0:12:27.836 recent times Colin Powell. In his day, le May's fame 0:12:27.996 --> 0:12:32.196 exceeded them all. People who couldn't name their congressman still knew. 0:12:31.996 --> 0:12:32.516 Who he was. 0:12:33.396 --> 0:12:36.796 In nineteen sixty four alone, three movies came out with 0:12:36.836 --> 0:12:39.996 a character plainly based on le May. He's the model 0:12:40.036 --> 0:12:43.636 for the Air Force general in Sidney Lemett's thriller Failsafe. 0:12:43.996 --> 0:12:48.276 He's clearly Burt Lancaster's character, General Scott in Seven Days 0:12:48.276 --> 0:12:50.476 in May, where the President choose him out. 0:12:51.076 --> 0:12:53.876 I am prepared to brand you for what you are, General, 0:12:55.036 --> 0:12:59.556 a strutting egoist with a Napoleonic power complex and an 0:12:59.556 --> 0:13:00.556 out and out traitor. 0:13:02.236 --> 0:13:05.996 And as if that's not enough, in Stanley Kuprick's Doctor Strangelove, 0:13:06.276 --> 0:13:10.356 the LeMay character is General Jack Ripper, played by Sterling Hayden, 0:13:10.676 --> 0:13:11.716 chomping on a cigar. 0:13:12.996 --> 0:13:16.756 Your commie has no regard for human life, not even 0:13:16.796 --> 0:13:20.196 his own. And for this reason, ma'am, I want to 0:13:20.196 --> 0:13:23.916 impress upon you the need for extreme watchfulness. 0:13:24.756 --> 0:13:28.916 In nineteen sixty four, when Doctor Strangelof came out, Americans 0:13:28.916 --> 0:13:32.996 were exhausted from anxiety about nuclear destruction. It felt good 0:13:33.036 --> 0:13:35.676 to laugh at a Cold War fanatic like General Jack Ripper, 0:13:36.396 --> 0:13:39.596 But the actual General le Maay was a more complicated matter. 0:13:48.756 --> 0:13:51.996 Curtis le May put himself through the engineering program at 0:13:51.996 --> 0:13:55.396 Ohio State, going to school by day and working all 0:13:55.516 --> 0:13:57.516 night at a foundry on the other side of town. 0:13:58.276 --> 0:14:03.196 He joined the Air Corps right out of college. He 0:14:03.236 --> 0:14:06.876 was a captain by thirty three, then in short order, 0:14:07.356 --> 0:14:11.196 a major, then a colonel, a brigadier general, and by 0:14:11.236 --> 0:14:15.796 the age of thirty seven, a major general. After the 0:14:15.796 --> 0:14:19.356 Second World War, he ran the Strategic Air Command SACK, 0:14:19.756 --> 0:14:22.196 the arm of the Air Force that controlled the bulk 0:14:22.196 --> 0:14:26.676 of America's nuclear arsenal. Russell Dardy, who followed le Maay 0:14:26.716 --> 0:14:29.356 as head of SACK, loved to tell a story about 0:14:29.356 --> 0:14:31.676 the time le Maay was briefed about a new airplane 0:14:31.716 --> 0:14:33.036 called the F one to eleven B. 0:14:33.996 --> 0:14:37.716 The briefings lasted about two and a half days, sometimes 0:14:37.716 --> 0:14:41.476 one hour, sometimes two hours, and finally they wrapped up 0:14:41.476 --> 0:14:45.276 the briefing. Let me hadn't said a word the whole time. 0:14:46.076 --> 0:14:49.156 We're just sitting there. After he got all through, General 0:14:49.196 --> 0:14:53.956 Lomay says that itt yeah, sure, that's it. And he 0:14:53.996 --> 0:14:56.516 got up and he says it ain't big enough and 0:14:56.636 --> 0:14:58.676 walked out. That was his only comment. 0:14:59.796 --> 0:15:03.036 Curtis le May commanded by silence. He liked to have 0:15:03.076 --> 0:15:05.596 a cigar in his mouth at all times, and he 0:15:05.716 --> 0:15:07.156 really didn't like to remove it. 0:15:07.756 --> 0:15:10.636 There was another illustration. I head first person with le May. 0:15:11.876 --> 0:15:14.756 I went with him out to CIA to get the 0:15:14.796 --> 0:15:18.036 briefings on what later became known as the Bay of Pigs. 0:15:18.356 --> 0:15:21.076 This was nineteen sixty one. The Bay of Pigs is 0:15:21.076 --> 0:15:23.556 one of the signature crises of the Cold War, a 0:15:23.676 --> 0:15:27.116 clandestine invasion of Cuba by a group of Cuban exiles 0:15:27.396 --> 0:15:28.436 backed by the CIA. 0:15:29.076 --> 0:15:32.636 We spent about three hours out there, got the full 0:15:32.876 --> 0:15:37.596 entire briefing down in the CIA briefing group, and when 0:15:37.596 --> 0:15:42.356 it was over, they said, generally, have any comments. Joel 0:15:42.396 --> 0:15:46.036 Levy got up, head for the door, says it won't work. 0:15:47.996 --> 0:15:51.396 That was his only comment, It won't work, And boy 0:15:51.436 --> 0:15:52.956 he was dead right, it didn't work. 0:15:53.756 --> 0:15:57.276 Three words, that's it, and of course he was right. 0:16:00.476 --> 0:16:03.276 Le Maay made his reputation after the US entered the 0:16:03.316 --> 0:16:06.516 Second World War. He was put in charge of the 0:16:06.556 --> 0:16:09.916 three hundred and fifth Bombardment Group out of Schalveston Air 0:16:09.916 --> 0:16:14.156 Base in England. It was a desperate time. The Air 0:16:14.196 --> 0:16:17.396 Corps was losing hundreds of planes on his bombing runs 0:16:17.436 --> 0:16:21.236 over Germany to anti aircraft fire and German fighter planes. 0:16:21.836 --> 0:16:25.716 The airmen knew they were essentially flying suicide missions, and 0:16:25.756 --> 0:16:29.076 the problem got so bad that the Air Force calculated 0:16:29.116 --> 0:16:33.156 that twenty percent of their pilots were aborting before they 0:16:33.196 --> 0:16:34.396 reached their targets. 0:16:34.956 --> 0:16:38.596 One of the commanders was Curtis LeMay, colonel in command 0:16:38.596 --> 0:16:39.756 of a B twenty four group. 0:16:40.316 --> 0:16:43.956 That's Robert McNamara, who would later become Secretary Defense during 0:16:43.956 --> 0:16:44.796 the Vietnam War. 0:16:45.676 --> 0:16:48.956 He was the finest combat commander of any service I 0:16:48.996 --> 0:16:51.956 came across in the war, but he was extraordinarily bligering, 0:16:52.076 --> 0:16:53.076 many thought brutal. 0:16:54.396 --> 0:16:57.316 In World War II, McNamara was an analyst for the 0:16:57.356 --> 0:17:01.316 Air Force. Here he is in Errol Morris's brilliant documentary 0:17:01.396 --> 0:17:04.476 Fog of War, describing what LeMay did after he heard 0:17:04.516 --> 0:17:06.236 that so many pilots were turning tail. 0:17:06.756 --> 0:17:08.916 He issued an ardery. He said, I will be in 0:17:08.916 --> 0:17:12.356 the lead plane on every mission. Any plane that takes 0:17:12.356 --> 0:17:14.876 off will go over the target or the crew will 0:17:14.916 --> 0:17:19.476 be court marcialed. The abort rate dropped over night. Now 0:17:19.516 --> 0:17:21.036 that's the kind of a commander he was. 0:17:22.756 --> 0:17:25.436 But that was just the beginning, because the air war 0:17:25.556 --> 0:17:30.196 over Europe still faced huge problems. Years later, in an interview, 0:17:30.476 --> 0:17:31.476 the May talked about it. 0:17:32.156 --> 0:17:35.396 One of the things that was very apparent was that 0:17:35.476 --> 0:17:37.036 the bombing was not very good. 0:17:37.916 --> 0:17:41.196 Bombers have cameras that take pictures of where their bombs 0:17:41.236 --> 0:17:44.236 fall strike photos, and when le May looked at the 0:17:44.276 --> 0:17:46.796 strike photos after the cruise had come back to base, 0:17:47.276 --> 0:17:49.716 he could see that the bombs were landing everywhere but 0:17:49.796 --> 0:17:50.316 the target. 0:17:51.076 --> 0:17:58.236 Not only were the targets not being destroyed, but I 0:17:58.276 --> 0:18:02.196 didn't have any records of foremost of the bombs actually fell. 0:18:03.676 --> 0:18:07.956 They were taking strike photos, of course, but you could 0:18:07.996 --> 0:18:11.396 not locate over half the bombs that were hauled over 0:18:11.556 --> 0:18:12.116 the continent. 0:18:13.236 --> 0:18:16.396 The problem was that the pilots were not flying straight 0:18:16.476 --> 0:18:19.356 at the targets. They believed that would make them sitting 0:18:19.396 --> 0:18:23.716 ducks for anti aircraft fire. Because enemy artillerymen on the 0:18:23.756 --> 0:18:28.396 ground would simply estimate the plane's speed and altitude and 0:18:28.516 --> 0:18:32.876 aim accordingly. So the pilots were taking evasive action, not 0:18:33.036 --> 0:18:36.156 flying directly at the target until the last few seconds 0:18:36.196 --> 0:18:38.556 of their bombing run, which is why the bombs were 0:18:38.556 --> 0:18:41.996 falling wide. How could you hit your target if you 0:18:41.996 --> 0:18:44.476 were lined up over it only at the very last moment. 0:18:44.956 --> 0:18:47.396 So something had to be done to give the bomb 0:18:47.396 --> 0:18:51.156 and there a chance to hit the target. Les mount 0:18:51.236 --> 0:18:54.316 a longer bomb run. They're giving them ample time. They 0:18:54.436 --> 0:18:57.236 get the bombs at level and get the rate and 0:18:57.316 --> 0:19:00.796 drift killed. In order to do a good job. 0:19:01.596 --> 0:19:05.396 Le Maay saw only one solution. The pilots had to 0:19:05.436 --> 0:19:09.356 stop taking evasive action. They had to fly straight in 0:19:09.676 --> 0:19:10.876 over the target. 0:19:11.076 --> 0:19:13.636 All of the people at I talk too that have 0:19:13.756 --> 0:19:16.636 been in combat or of the opinion that if you 0:19:16.716 --> 0:19:20.116 did this, had aircraft guns that shoots you down. 0:19:20.876 --> 0:19:25.276 Key phrase of the opinion. LeMay was an empiricist. He 0:19:25.316 --> 0:19:28.556 went back and studied his old artillery manuals, did some 0:19:28.676 --> 0:19:32.076 calculations how many rounds from an anti aircraft gun would 0:19:32.076 --> 0:19:34.316 it take to bring down a B seventeen bomber. 0:19:34.556 --> 0:19:37.836 And it worked out it required I think three hundred 0:19:37.836 --> 0:19:42.596 and seventy some rounds to hit it. This didn't look 0:19:42.676 --> 0:19:43.476 too bad to me. 0:19:44.436 --> 0:19:47.316 Three hundred and seventy seven rounds is a lot of ammunition. 0:19:47.716 --> 0:19:50.276 So flying straight is a risk, but it's not a 0:19:50.316 --> 0:19:53.876 crazy risk. So LeMay says, let's try it. Let's fly 0:19:53.956 --> 0:19:56.996 in straight instead of a ten second run, Let's fly 0:19:57.116 --> 0:20:01.396 a seven minute long, straight and steady approach. And if 0:20:01.396 --> 0:20:04.156 that sounded suicidal, which it did to all of his pilots, 0:20:04.196 --> 0:20:06.716 he says, once again, I'm going to be the first 0:20:06.716 --> 0:20:11.756 to try it. So le May led the way November 0:20:11.916 --> 0:20:16.236 nineteen forty two over Santa's Air France. No evasive action, 0:20:17.916 --> 0:20:20.956 and what happened. His group put twice as many bombs 0:20:20.956 --> 0:20:24.316 on the target as any group had before and didn't 0:20:24.476 --> 0:20:25.756 lose a single bomber. 0:20:26.556 --> 0:20:30.636 So we did it and it worked out. I'll admit 0:20:31.036 --> 0:20:33.756 some uneasias on my part and some of the other 0:20:33.796 --> 0:20:36.316 people on the outset when they made that first straight 0:20:36.356 --> 0:20:37.156 in bomb run. 0:20:37.196 --> 0:20:46.156 But at work, I'll admit some uneasiness, he says. That's it, 0:20:46.276 --> 0:20:52.036 some uneasiness. After the war, in nineteen forty nine, there 0:20:52.076 --> 0:20:54.876 was a movie starring Gregory Peck called twelve o'clock High 0:20:55.276 --> 0:20:57.916 about that moment in the Air War, it won a 0:20:57.916 --> 0:21:01.796 couple of Oscars. The lead character General Frank Savage was 0:21:01.796 --> 0:21:04.236 based in part on le May, and in the movie, 0:21:04.316 --> 0:21:06.916 General Savage is under so much stress trying to keep 0:21:06.916 --> 0:21:10.116 his pilots flying on these impossible mission that he has 0:21:10.116 --> 0:21:15.116 a nervous breakdown. Screenwriters love the idea that beneath a 0:21:15.196 --> 0:21:19.396 stoic exterior is a hurricane of repressed emotion, But that's 0:21:19.516 --> 0:21:24.276 Hollywood's le May, not the actual Lea May. One of 0:21:24.316 --> 0:21:27.356 LeMay's pilots, later said that when he shared his fears 0:21:27.396 --> 0:21:31.836 about flying a combat mission, le Maay replied, Ralph, you're 0:21:31.876 --> 0:21:34.916 probably going to get killed, so it's best to accept it. 0:21:35.436 --> 0:21:42.116 You'll get along much better now. That's le May. He 0:21:42.236 --> 0:21:46.356 reserved his emotions for the thing he truly loved flying. 0:21:47.756 --> 0:21:51.276 Here he is years later rhapsodizing about a mission some 0:21:51.356 --> 0:21:55.436 of his bombers ran against an aircraft factory in occupied Poland. 0:21:56.596 --> 0:21:59.716 Well, well, you have done some very accurate bombing, and 0:22:00.516 --> 0:22:05.956 some of our jobs I remember Russ Wilson's group have, 0:22:06.076 --> 0:22:11.636 in my position, knowing, attacked on Marion Third over a 0:22:11.756 --> 0:22:14.236 pole on which is a nerve draft factory over there. 0:22:16.236 --> 0:22:19.796 He put down a beautiful pattern on this, saying, I 0:22:19.796 --> 0:22:22.516 don't think a single bomb thought fell outside defense. 0:22:22.556 --> 0:22:27.036 As a factory, he put down a beautiful pattern on 0:22:27.156 --> 0:22:29.876 that thing, meaning that when the May looked at the 0:22:29.876 --> 0:22:32.716 strike photos from the bombing run the next day back 0:22:32.756 --> 0:22:35.876 at base, the marks left by the bombs on the 0:22:35.916 --> 0:22:39.596 roof of the factory took on a shape that pleased 0:22:39.596 --> 0:22:52.556 his eye. In the early years of the Second World War, Curtis, 0:22:52.596 --> 0:22:56.076 the May and the bomber mafia were frustrated. They felt 0:22:56.156 --> 0:22:57.356 no one was listening to them. 0:22:57.916 --> 0:22:59.636 The air was just getting the back of the hand 0:22:59.676 --> 0:23:01.636 and out of the ways. I'll tell you what the 0:23:01.796 --> 0:23:02.116 very were. 0:23:02.596 --> 0:23:04.676 The air was just getting the back of the hand, 0:23:04.756 --> 0:23:07.956 LeMay says, meaning when the top brass sat down in 0:23:08.076 --> 0:23:10.996 Washington to play the course of the war, they didn't 0:23:11.036 --> 0:23:13.476 understand what the bomber could do, that it was capable 0:23:13.516 --> 0:23:17.036 of winning a war all by itself. Years later, LeMay 0:23:17.156 --> 0:23:19.356 still felt the sting of that attitude. 0:23:19.796 --> 0:23:24.796 Our own airport up and Washington was consisted of a 0:23:24.836 --> 0:23:28.476 bunch of dollars a year, characters, people who didn't know 0:23:28.596 --> 0:23:33.236 much about it, senting out stuff that I didn't much 0:23:33.276 --> 0:23:37.396 agree with, But orders were orders carried them out. 0:23:37.436 --> 0:23:41.956 The best could redemption when it finally came. What happened 0:23:41.996 --> 0:23:42.836 on the other side of the. 0:23:42.796 --> 0:23:47.116 World Vandal havoc root by the Japanese bombers. At the 0:23:47.156 --> 0:23:49.756 upper part of the screen. There you can see them. 0:23:50.196 --> 0:23:54.436 The people are bewildered by the blow without warning. 0:23:54.756 --> 0:23:57.636 With the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December of 0:23:57.756 --> 0:24:01.036 nineteen forty one, the US was dragged into a hard 0:24:01.076 --> 0:24:04.756 and costly battle against the Japanese Empire in the Pacific, 0:24:06.436 --> 0:24:10.476 and as that war ground on, one thing slowly became clear. 0:24:11.236 --> 0:24:13.716 The only way to beat Japan was to take the 0:24:13.756 --> 0:24:18.596 fight to Japan directly. One option was a land invasion, 0:24:19.196 --> 0:24:22.476 but that was a terrifying prospect. It could easily end 0:24:22.556 --> 0:24:25.756 up being one of the deadliest and costliest campaigns of 0:24:25.796 --> 0:24:29.356 the whole war. The Second World War was supposed to 0:24:29.356 --> 0:24:32.516 be winding down. No one had any appetite for a 0:24:32.596 --> 0:24:35.516 land invasion, So was there a way to bring about 0:24:35.556 --> 0:24:40.636 Japan's surrender through the air. Yes, the bomber mafia said, 0:24:41.076 --> 0:24:41.756 we can do it. 0:24:43.076 --> 0:24:46.676 The story begins in nineteen thirty nine when the far 0:24:46.836 --> 0:24:50.516 sighted Army Air Forces said, we want a plane for 0:24:50.596 --> 0:24:53.996 our defense. That could fly a bomb load thousands of 0:24:53.996 --> 0:24:55.876 miles out to see and return. 0:24:57.356 --> 0:25:00.316 When the bombing Mafia first set up shop back in 0:25:00.356 --> 0:25:05.596 the early nineteen thirties, their theorizing was hypothetical. They imagined 0:25:05.676 --> 0:25:09.836 fleets of bombers flying deep into enemy territory, dropping bombs 0:25:09.836 --> 0:25:12.916 from the safety of high altitudes, but there was no 0:25:12.996 --> 0:25:16.476 airplane actually capable of doing that at the time. It 0:25:16.596 --> 0:25:20.596 was a bomber muffia fantasy until the arrival midway through 0:25:20.636 --> 0:25:25.476