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Aviation History
1944
1944 - 1316.PDF
682 FLIGHT WAR IN THE AIR E 29TH, 1944 civilians in the South of England or is shot down into the sea. They have accumulated just so many specimens at the launching bases and are pre pared to expend them all. Replacement DEPLACEMENT is another matter. •"-*• Whether any more are beitig manufactured in the workshops after the intensive efforts of Allied bombers in recent weeks, we have no means of knowing ; but if so it must be a diffi cult job to get them from the factories to the launching bases. They cannot be flown up, and must be taken by rail or road. Both these means of communication have been consider ably dislocated by the recent bomb ing, and both must now be congested by the movement of troops and stores tip to the battlefield in Normandy. Substantial replacements after the initial supply has been expended are hardly to be expected.* Apart from any device which our scientists may discover, the final cure for the pest is the capture of the bases by the Allied armies. A beginning has been made in that direction, and it is to be hoped that the remaining bases will fall into our hands before lojlg. It is surprisiryf^how little response the Lujtivaffe hps made to the invasion of Normandj^ It has made only spojfidic ap^arances, doubtless being Trawed JF/ the terrific concentration f Alliedjmghters over the area. At time some of the strategic b?knbejf raids by the Allies have met jjtfilb jpmparatively little opposition in fthe jR« although the flak has been KegftF Consequently, Allied bombers have been left more or less free to go where they willed. Cherbourg Har bour, for instance, was well bombed from the air, as well as being shelled by warships. Air supremacy over the battle area has been so complete that the U.S. Army 8th Air" Force presently felt itself free to turn to non-tactical targets. Synthetic oil refineries came in for some continuous attention. That was doubtless a considered follow-up of the destruction of the last refinery of natural oil at Ploesti. There have been times when our authorities have talked about oil as being the Achilles' heel, of the Axis, but the Germans have never been actually short oi oil. Transport and communications would still seem to be more important targets, for it cannot be said that even the great efforts of British and American aircraft have so sealed off the Normandy battlefield that reinforcements cannot be brought up to aid Rommel in his stand. Bombers to the Rescue "*kT7HAT was of obvious help to Gen. ' * Eisenhower was the bombing of Boulogne and Havre. The former place received a lot of attention before " D " day, and it was subsequently made known that it was an intermediate base for E-boats and R-boats. From there they would push on to their advanced base at Havre, hoping that from such close quarters they could do sub stantial damage to the invasion ship ping. It was for this reason that quite soon after the landings on the beaches Bomber Command departed from its usual practice and sent out Lancaster* TAIL URGE : Fitting the, electric firing leads to a heap of rocket projectiles on a Typhoon airfield. FULL STEAM AHEAD! A German merchantman in the Aegean Sea after an attack by rocket-firing Beaufighters. and Halifaxes by day to bomb first Havre and then Boulogne. At Havre 12,000-lb. bombs were dropped in the harbour so as to send a most damaging tidal wave up into the pens. The boats moored in the harbour all dis appeared, and must have been sunk. That was a case in which Bomber Command, despite its preoccupation,, with the assault on production, gave most valuable tactical help to the Navy and Army. It may also be men tioned that Coastal Command has helped to bomb Cherbourg Harboiy. Thus the promise made long ago by the Air Staff that when the invasion began the whole of the Air Force * would come to the aid of the other two Services has been made good. Ground and Air ANOTHER incident from the early -^ days of the invasion seems to have received less attention than it deserved. A German force had hidden itself so completely in some woods that Typhoons of the 2nd Tactical Air Force could see no signs of it. The artillery, however, knew where the Germans were, and they fired smoke shells to point out the spot to the Typhoons. The latter had rockets, and promptly came down to use them. The incident illustrates the apex which co-operation between ground and air has reached, and is therefore extremely interesting. All the same, it seems a reversal of the natural order of things. It is more usual for aircraft V to tell the ground troops where the enemy are.; also, if the enemy are
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