actually in commission. Of these, the majority could carry only one depth bomb. Adm. Adolphus Andrews, Commander, ESF summed up the air situation in words reminiscent of those he used to describe the paucity of surface vessels. He wrote to COMINCH on 14 January 1942: “There are no effective planes attached to the frontier, First, Third, Fourth, or Fifth Naval District capable of maintaining long-range seaward patrols.” Nor did he receive much more comfort from higher headquarters on this topic than on that of the extra destroyers. In reply to his urgent request for air reinforcement he received the reply that allocation of additional air forces was “dependent on future production.” Here, as elsewhere in the early days of 1942, the demands for men and equipment were great but the supply small.
So the burden for antisubmarine patrol fell mainly on the Army Air Forces whose units had been neither trained nor equipped for that specific task, but were nevertheless better able than the Navy’s air arm to present a menacing front to the enemy. As soon as the news of Pearl Harbor arrived, the Commander of the North Atlantic Naval coastal Frontier requested the Commanding General of the Eastern Defense Command to undertake offshore patrols with all available aircraft. On the afternoon of 8 December 1941, units of the I Bomber Command began overwater patrols, and for nearly 10 months that command bore the brunt of the air war against the U-boats. But it was a motley array of aircraft that the Bomber Command assembled in December and January to meet the submarine threat. Almost on the same day on which it was called upon to undertake overwater patrol duties was stripped of the best trained of its tactical units for missions on the West Coast and for overseas assignment. Every available Army plane in the First Air Force capable of carrying a bomb load was drafted to augment what was left of I Bomber Command. As a result of these frantic efforts approximately 10 two-engine aircraft of various sizes and types were assembled and placed at the disposal of the naval commander. To this force, likened by one observer to the taxi cab army by means of which the French attempted, in 1914, to stem the German advance, the I Air Support Command added substantial aid in the way of reconnaissance. Admiral Andrews described the operation of these Army air units, on 14 January 1942, as follows:
The Army Air Support Command is operating during daylight hours patrols in single-motored land observation planes extending about forty miles offshore from Portland, Maine, to Wilmington, NC. These planes are not armed and carry only sufficient fuel for flights of between two or three hours. The pilots are inexperienced in the type of work they are endeavoring to do. Not more than ten of these observation planes are in the air along the Coastal Frontier at any one time.
The First Bomber Command has been maintaining, since the week of 7 December 1941, patrols from Westover Field, Mass.; Mitchell Field, NY; and Langley field, VA; and as of 11 January 1942 are commencing patrols from Bangor, Maine. These patrols, averaging three planes each, have extended, weather permitting and according to the type of plane, to a maximum distance of six hundred miles to sea. Two flights each day are being made from the aforementioned fields. The First Bomber Command has been utilizing approximately half of its available equipment in order to maintain these patrols, at the expense of a striking force which could be called upon in case of enemy attack.
It was a creditable effort, all things considered, but the Army forces were themselves pitifully inadequate. By 31 January 1943, the I Air Support Command reported 114 planes, of which 93 were in commission; the I Bomber Command numbered 119 planes of which only 45 were carried as in commission.
If the forces available during December and January for anti-submarine activity were too small for the job, they were even weaker in equipment and organization. Hunting submarines is a highly specialized business, as all those concerned found out during the next few months. Yet little had been done prior to the outbreak of hostilities to develop the specialized technique and materials required to carry it on successfully. Except for the establishment of a Joint Control and Information Center little had been done to set up the system of communication and intelligence necessary to cope adequately with such a highly mobile, not to say illusive, enemy. Fortunately, the U-boats did not begin operations in US waters for nearly a month, which gave the I Bomber Command time to organize some sort of wire communication to all its bases, to establish an intelligence system through which information could be relayed from Bomber Command headquarters to the squadron operations room, and from Bomber Command airplanes to headquarters. By the end of January, however, the problem of transmitting intelligence remained a vexing one.
The Army suffered also from poorly equipped planes and inadequately trained personnel. Charges to this effect were frequently made and were well justified. Most of the units involved in the anti-submarine war were, at this early date, still in a training status, and those best trained had been taken away for service in the West. In addition, prowar agreements had assigned overwater operations to the Navy and had placed restrictions on Army overwater flying. So it is scarcely surprising that the Army planes entered on their adopted task with demolition bombs instead of depth charges and with crews who were ill-trained in naval identification or in the best method of attacking submarines. The aircraft used against the U-boats were generally unsuited to that kind of work. All, with the exception of a squadron of B-17’s, were of relatively short range and limited carrying capacity. And all, of course, as yet lacked special detection equipment. The old B-18, though obsolescent, proved to be the most useful in the early months, but even they were at first scarce.
Those in charge of the antisubmarine war attacked these problems wholeheartedly. They revived the training program to convert crews, hitherto accustomed only to high-altitude bombings, to the intricacies of low-level attack on submerged targets. They adapted the aircraft as fast as the materials became available and the necessary research could bear fruit. As operations continued and experience was collected, it became evident that successful warfare against U-boats demanded improved methods of joint control in order to dispatch both air and surface forces to the scene of a sighting as rapidly as the situation required. Here the British, who had accumulated a good deal of experience in this sort of work, contributed vitally to the improvement of the joint control system. With the help of several experienced liaison officers, sent to America for the purpose, a new “control room” was projected which led to more effective cooperation between Army and Navy forces. The original control room permitted “joint” operations, but the two services worked independently in different parts of the same building, each maintaining its own situation plot and receiving intelligence from different sources. There was little interchange of information or methods.
By the end of March it is possible to notice very real improvement in the situation. Though the U-boats continued in increasing numbers to exact an increasing toll of merchant shipping, they also met increasing opposition in the coastal waters. Operational hours flown by AAF planes in March were well over double those flown in January. Relatively few attacks were made even yet, and their quality left much to be desired. But the submarines were being forced more and more to submerge, which prevented as free hunting on their part as they had formerly enjoyed. A very few Army planes were beginning to be equipped with radar, another stop, though a small one, in the right direction. In March, too, the first offshore patrol missions were flown by the Civil Air Patrol. Although totally insu8ited in both training and equipment to antisubmarine warfare, these auxiliary units were able to assume some of the burden of reconnaissance flying.
Many difficulties of course remained. More and better-trained personnel, more and better-equipped aircraft, a better communications system—these were only the more obvious requirements in the Army antisubmarine force. Much more deeply rooted was the problem of jurisdiction which arose out of the anomalous position of the AAF units engaged in antisubmarine operations. The I Bomber Command was, in fact, waging full-scale antisubmarine war, yet it enjoyed no correspondingly adequate legal position. It was still theoretically acting in an emergency capacity, in support of Naval forces, and might at any time be withdrawn to its normal duties of bombardment. Indeed, training had to be conducted literally on two levels both for low-level antisubmarine attacks and for high-level bombing in connection with coastal defense. Worse still, no system of unified command had been set up specifically for that type of joint operations peculiar to antisubmarine warfare. Prior to 26 March 1942, in fact, even the command relationship existing
