- Chapter III:
-
- BRITISH-AMERICAN PLANS
- January-November 1941
-
- The partial dissociation of military planning from national policy
limited the usefulness of the American military plans, yet it had a
beneficial effect. It left the President and the Army Chief of Staff
in a fairly loose relationship in which they- could take, the measure
of each other's problems before entering the invariably difficult
relationships between a wartime political leader and his
professional military advisers on strategy. Moreover, it left the Army
planners a great deal of freedom to discuss with British staff
officers the use of Army forces in coalition strategy, much more
freedom than they would have had if American staff plans for using
Army forces had been authoritative interpretations of the President's views
on military strategy. The discussions did not, of course, lead under the circumstances no discussions could properly have led-
- to agreement on the chief questions concerning the use of Army
forces that would confront the United States and Great Britain as
allies fighting against a common enemy, but they did a great deal to
dispel ignorance and preconceptions, the formidable internal enemies
that may easily be the undoing of military coalitions.
-
-
- The British-American staff talks opened in Washington on 29 January
and continued to 29 March 1941. The meetings came to be referred to
as the ABC: meetings (American-British Conversations), and the final
report by the short title, ABC-1.
1
-
- The head of the American delegation was General Embick, who then
represented the Army on the Permanent Joint Board on Defense
(Canada-United States ) . Embick was the most experienced and most
forthright of the American planners. His seniority .vas much in
his favor, since it qualified him to meet the British Army-
- [32]
- representative on equal terms. The other Army members were Brig.
Gen. Leonard T. Gerow, the new head of the Army planning staff; Brig.
Gen. Sherman Miles, the Acting Assistant Chief of Staff, G-2 ; and
Col. Joseph T. McNarney, an Air officer who was thoroughly familiar
with current war planning. 2
The Navy section was headed by Admiral
Ghormley, the Special Naval Observer in London, who returned to the
United States for the conferences. He was accompanied by Capt. Alan G.
Kirk, the naval attaché, Brig. Gen. Raymond E. Lee, the Army attaché,
and the British delegation to the conference. 3
-
- The British representatives were Rear Adm. R. M. Bellairs; Rear Adm.
V. H. Danckwerts; Maj. Gen. E. L. Morris; Lt. Col. A. T.
Cornwall-Jones, who had accompanied the newly appointed ambassador
to the United States, Lord Halifax; and two officers stationed in
Washington, Air Commodore J. C. Slessor of the British Purchasing
Commission and Capt. A. W. Clarke, RN, the British assistant naval attaché.
4
-
- General Marshall and Admiral Stark welcomed the British
representatives and dwelt on the need for secrecy, warning that public
knowledge of the mere fact that conversations were in progress might
have an unfavorable effect on the lend-lease bill, which was then
before the Congress, and indeed "might well be disastrous." 5
-
- At the first meeting the British delegation made clear that they had
come as a corporate body representing the Chiefs of Staff in their
collective capacity as military advisers to the War Cabinet, and had
complete freedom to discuss the general strategic position and to
consider dispositions in the event the United States should enter the
war. Any conclusion reached, however, would have to be confirmed by
the British Chiefs of Staff and the British Government. This
reservation was similar to the one imposed by the Chief of Staff and
Chief of Naval Operations-that any plans agreed upon would be
contingent upon future political action of both nations, as well as
the approval of the respective Chiefs of Staff. 6
-
- The agenda proposed by the U. S. staff committee provided for a
general discussion of the national military positions of the
- [33]
- United States and Great Britain; consideration of the strategy of
joint military and naval action by the United States and the British
Commonwealth in both the Atlantic and the Pacific; operations to
carry out the proposed strategy; and agreements on the division of
responsibility by areas, forces to be committed, skeleton operating
plans, and command arrangements.7
The British accepted this
agenda but proposed to extend the discussion of courses of joint
action to include strategy in the Mediterranean and the Middle East
as well as in the Atlantic and the Pacific.
-
-
- Before the opening of the conversations the American staff had very
little chance to study the latest views of the British
representatives. Admiral Ghormley and General Lee had tried to
secure answers to a long list of questions that the American staff
wanted answered-among others the relative importance to the British
Empire of North Africa, Egypt, Palestine, the Malay Archipelago, and
Hong Kong; British capabilities and strength in the Mediterranean; and
the British plan of action if the Germans moved south into Italy. The
British staff would not furnish the answers, on the ground that to do
so might jeopardize the security of British war plans, until the
British party had embarked for the United States. General Lee reported
his concern over this development to the War Department, fearing
that the American staff would not have sufficient time to study the
British proposals and might find themselves rushed into agreements
with the British by a march of events that might make time a vital
consideration. 8
This feeling of
wariness unquestionably existed throughout the American staff at the
beginning of the conference.
-
- Grand Strategy and the Issue of Singapore
-
- At the opening of the conversations the British representatives
presented a clear, complete summary of their views. They began with
three propositions of general strategic policy:
- The European theatre is the vital theatre where a decision must
first be sought.
- The general policy should therefore be to defeat Germany and Italy
first, and then deal with Japan.
- The security of the Far Eastern position, including Australia and
New Zealand, is essential to the cohesion of the British Commonwealth and to the maintenance of its war effort. Singapore is
the key to the defense of these interests and its retention must be
assured. 9
-
- The first two propositions were evidently in accord with the views
of the American representatives; the third evidently was not.
-
- As a corollary to their review of strategy the British proposed that
American naval forces, after making necessary provision for the
defense of the Western Hemisphere, should make their main effort in
"the Atlantic and European theatres," and that American
naval dispositions in the Pacific should nevertheless be such as to
"ensure that Japanese operations in the Far East
- [34]
- cannot prejudice the main effort of the United States and the
British Commonwealth in the principal theatres of war." 10
Read
in the light of British views on grand strategy, this declaration
amounted to a proposal that the United States should underwrite the
defense of Singapore.
-
- The British representatives frankly explained their position. As
they pointed out, the United Kingdom, the Dominions, and India
"must maintain dispositions which, in all eventualities, will
provide for the ultimate security of the British Commonwealth of
Nations." It was a "cardinal feature" of British policy
to retain "a position in the Far East such as will ensure the
cohesion and security of the British Commonwealth and the maintenance
of its war effort" the naval base at Singapore. 11
It was,
therefore, the aim of the British to persuade the Americans to
recommend the adoption of this feature of British strategic policy as
a feature of Anglo-American strategic policy and to agree that the
United States, in recognition of the importance of holding Singapore, should send to Singapore four heavy cruisers and one
aircraft carrier, together with planes and submarines. 12
-
- This proposal had a long history and was an important feature of
Prime Minister Churchill's strategic policy. On 15 May 1940, in his
first official message to the President, the Prime Minister had
proposed, among other measures, that the United States "keep the Japanese quiet in the
Pacific, using
Singapore in any way convenient" and gave notice that he would
bring up the question again. (It was at that time that the U. S. Fleet
was ordered to stay at Pearl Harbor.) 13
Early in the fall, soon after
the Japanese Government had announced its adherence to the alliance of
the Axis Powers (the Anti-Comintern Pact), the Prime Minister had
proposed that the United States send a naval squadron to
Singapore. 14
Admiral Stark and General Marshall had then
recommended strongly against taking any such step. 15
-
- The American staff representatives were particularly attentive- to
the revival of this proposal since the British Government was once
again urging the same views on the United States through diplomatic
channels. 16
The American representatives, reemphasizing the
nonpolitical nature of the staff conversations, protested what
appeared to them to be an attempt to secure
- [35]
- political pressure to influence their decision on Singapore. 17
-
- On 11 February the British, at the request of the Americans,
presented their views in writing. 18
The U. S. Army members were
unanimously of the opinion that acceptance of the British proposal
would be contrary to the instructions that had been approved for their
guidance and would constitute "a strategic error of incalculable
magnitude," and so informed the Chief of Staff. 19
On 13
February they met with their Navy colleagues to go over the British
paper. Admiral Turner, who had prepared a statement in reply, traced
the history of the successive British requests for American naval
aid at Singapore, back to the fall of 1938 when President Roosevelt
and Secretary of State Cordell Hull had "more or less committed
the United States Fleet to actions in conjunction with the British
forces in the Far East. 20
The Army and Navy representatives
were alike fearful that the President might accede to the urgent
British demand and, at the suggestion of General Embick, they
discussed how best to inform the President of the views of the
American staff. 21
-
- The Army and Navy sections submitted their joint views to the Chief
of Staff and the Chief of Naval Operations and, finally, to the British. The
British representatives acknowledged, indeed insisted, that it would
not be necessary to hold Singapore in order to protect Australia and
New Zealand or to prevent the movement of a large Japanese fleet into
the Indian Ocean. The successful defense of Singapore would not
prevent the Japanese from operating against British communications in
the Indian Ocean, since the Japanese could certainly take and use
Kamranh Bay or Batavia for this purpose. An American fleet in the
Pacific, actively threatening the Japanese left flank, would be enough
to prevent the Japanese from extending their operations so far from
home.
-
- The British representatives made it very plain that Singapore was
none the less important to their government as a symbol of British
ability and determination to protect the British Dominions and
colonies and the overseas trade with them and with other countries in
the Orient. The loss of Singapore, irrespective of its military
value, would weaken the hand of those political leaders in Australia,
New Zealand, and India-and 'also in China-who believed in the value of
close association with Great Britain. The actual weakness of Singapore
as a base, in view of the development of air power and the possibility
of Japanese land operations in Malaya, did not detract from the
symbolic value of Singapore but instead obliged the British to insist
on its protection as an end in itself.
-
- The British representatives did not rest their case entirely on the
political importance of holding Singapore. They asserted also the
operational value of Singapore as a "card of re-entry" into
the South China Sea. They reasoned that, even though the fate of
Singapore would not affect the rate and extent of Japanese conquests,
it would
- [36]
- become vitally important at the point when the war against Germany
and Italy should have taken a turn for the better. If the British
still held Singapore, they could hope to re-establish their position
in the South China Sea; if they had lost Singapore, they could not
hope to do so. They concluded:
-
- Even if we were able to eliminate Italy and the Italian fleet as an
active enemy; even if with United States' assistance the situation in
the Atlantic and home waters were to undergo some drastic change for
the better, such as would enable us to reduce our naval strength in
the west-even if Germany as well as Italy were defeated, it is at
least highly problematical whether we could ever restore the
position in the East. To carry out a successful attack and gain a
foothold against opposition in East Asia and the Indies, thousands of
miles from our nearest base, would be a colossal undertaking. It is
open to doubt whether it would be a practicable operation of war in
any circumstances. In the conditions in which it would have to be
faced, when we should be exhausted by the strain of a long anal
desperate struggle from which we had only just emerged, we are
doubtful whether we should even be able to attempt it. 22
-
- In short, as the British representatives stated, British insistence
on the defense of Singapore was based "not only upon purely
strategic foundations, but on political, economic and sentimental
considerations which, even if not literally vital on a strictly
academic view, are of such fundamental importance to the British
Commonwealth that they must always be taken into serious
account." 23
The British representatives did not make entirely
explicit the very strong reasons, from a British point of view, why
the United States should intervene promptly and decisively in the Far
East. The American representatives understood, however, that the
critical point was the prestige of the British Empire in the Far East and at home. They
replied that the concern of the British Government on this score, as
well as on the accompanying military disadvantages, in particular
the loss of important sources of the rubber and oil of the East
Indies, was very natural. But, to them, losses in the Far East seemed
to be of secondary importance
-
- The general moral effect of the loss of Singapore and the
Philippines would be severe. Singapore has been built up in public
opinion as a symbol of the power of the British Empire. The eastern
Dominions, the Netherlands East Indies, and China, look upon its
security as the guarantee of their safety. Its value as a symbol has
become so great that its capture by Japan would be a serious blow. But
many severe blows have been taken by these various nations, and other
severe blows can be absorbed without leading to final disaster. 24
-
- This comment, to be sure, did not deal with the effect on Great
Britain itself of the weakening or loss of the British position in the
Far East, upon which (as the British representatives had pointed out)
the economy of tile United Kingdom was heavily dependent. But the
American representatives made it clear that, in their opinion, the
security of the North Atlantic and of the British Isles was the common
basis of American-British strategy, and that it was up to the British
to do the best they could to take care of their interests elsewhere,
even as it was up to the United States to defend American interests
overseas. Their vital common concern was to meet and eliminate the
German threat to the security of the North Atlantic and the British
Isles. On this basis the American representatives refused to join the
British in recommending
- [37]
- that the retention of Singapore or the security of the Far Eastern
positions be recognized as vital Allied aims or that the United
States send naval units to Singapore. Instead, they proposed that
the British should recognize that
-
- The objective of the war will be most effectively attained by the
United States exerting its principal military effort in the Atlantic
or navally in the Mediterranean regions.
- In explanation, they stated
- The United States Staff Committee agrees that the retention of
Singapore is very desirable. But it also believes that the diversion
to the Asiatic theater of sufficient forces to assure the retention
of Singapore might jeopardize the success of the main effort of the
Associated Powers. From the broad view this diversion would amount to
employment of the final reserve of the Associated Powers in a
non-decisive theater. A commitment on the part of the United States to
assure the retention of Singapore carries with it a further
commitment to employ the forces necessary to accomplish that mission.
It implies that the United States will undertake the early defeat of
Japan and that it accepts responsibility for the safety of a large
portion of the British Empire. No one can predict accurately the
forces that will be required in such an effort, but it is conceivable
that a large part of United States army and naval forces would
ultimately be involved. 25
-
- Aircraft Allocations
-
- Two matters of great concern to the British delegation were the
allocation of American-produced aircraft and the disposition of
American air forces. The delegation proposed that the United States
should develop its entire air program so as to meet the critical
British needs during the first year of American participation in the war, deferring the planned
expansion of American air forces to the extent that it conflicted
with British demands for planes and equipment, and assigning such
American units as became available (after meeting essential defense
requirements) where the British currently had the most acute need of
them, irrespective of the effect on the long-range American training
program.
-
- The discussion of air strategy did not produce a sharp conflict
between British and American views. In answer to American questions,
the British representatives explained that, of course, they were
talking not about the current situation but about the hypothetical
situation with which the conversations as a whole were intended to
deal-the situation in which the United States and Great Britain would
be fighting side by side. They recognized not only that the United
States must provide for its own defensive requirements but also that
American leaders "could not-if only for political reasons-afford
to ignore the need to build up their own air services." They
further explained that they did not aim at the aggrandizement of the
Royal Air Force at the expense of the U. S. Army Air Corps. They
acknowledged
-
- The British suggestion amounts simply to this; that, in the event of
United States intervention in the war, the common cause could best
be served if the United States authorities base their programme on
first reducing the disparity between the air forces of Germany and
those of the British and the United States which are actively engaged
in war, by extending as much direct and indirect assistance as
possible to the British; and that, with this end in view, the
Associated Powers should be prepared to accept the inevitable result
that United States collaboration, in the form of the provision of
formed units in the second year, would be less than would be possible
- [38]
- if the United States were to concentrate from the beginning on their
own expansion. 26
-
- In deciding how to answer the British proposal the American staff
committee had first to take into account the need to provide air
forces for the security of the United States and the rest of the
Western Hemisphere should the British Isles fall. The Army Air Corps
estimated that forces required to meet this contingency to be 54
trained combat groups (the First Aviation Objective) plus personnel
and facilities for immediate expansion to 100 combat groups (the
Second Aviation Objective). 27
There was every reason to believe
that Germany had accurate knowledge of American production capacity
and potential and would assume that American aid to Great Britain
could not materially affect the relative air strengths before the
winter of 1941-42. For the same reason, however, Germany could be
expected to launch intensified air attacks and an invasion against the
British Isles before the winter of 1941-42. On the basis of this
reasoning, the critical period for Great Britain would extend until 1
November 1941. The American staff committee was inclined to take
the risk of holding up its 54-group program as long as the United
States was not actively engaged in the war. 28
-
- The details of the agreement were worked out in a separate report
known by its short title, ABC-2. 29
It provided that the first charge
on American plane production would be the allocations made to the
British and that until such time as the United States might enter the
war, the British would receive the entire output from any new aircraft
capacity. If the United States should enter the war, increases in
output would be divided about equally between the United States and
Great Britain. Though deferring fulfillment of the 54-group program,
the U. S. Army Air Corps would start on a 100-group program to provide
training facilities for 30,000 pilots and 100,000 technicians a
year.
-
- The policy adopted by the United States staff' committee for active
American air participation, should the United States enter the war,
entailed protecting a U. S. naval base to be established in Iceland
and furnishing air support to the Royal Air Force in the British
Isles. Colonel McNarney explained this policy at the meeting of the
United States staff committee with the British delegation on
17 February 1941
-
- This general policy envisioned that pursuit aviation would be so
disposed as to afford protection to United States' naval operating
bases. Bombardment aviation would be grouped in a single general area
for operations with the British Bomber Command. That the United
States forces would normally
- [39]
- operate against objectives in Germany, but would, of course, operate
against invasion ports or other vital objectives, in accordance with
the demands of the existing situation. 30
-
- Three groups of pursuit aviation were to be sent to the British
Isles during 1941 as they became available, initially to Northern
Ireland, where there would be two naval bases. Eventually, when
these pursuit groups were broken in, they would be sent to more active
sectors in England. Three groups of heavy bombers and two groups of
medium bombers were to be sent to England to operate under U. S.
commanders in the British Bomber Command. No commitments were made in
the course of the staff conversations for air participation in the Far
East or in the Middle East. 31
But the Air Corps was exploring the
possibility of sending aviation units to the Middle East some time
later:
-
- We have avoided any commitments in this area. However, in 1942 and
1943 it will probably be impossible to crowd any more operating units
into the British Isles. We are now studying the possibility of
supporting a large air force in Egypt, Asiatic Turkey and Syria via
the Red Sea, with an airways via Takoradi, British Gold Coast to
Cairo.
-
- Subject to the provision of air forces for the security of the
Western Hemisphere and British Isles, agreement was reached that the
main objective of the Associated Powers would be to achieve air
superiority over Germany at the earliest possible time, particularly
in long-range striking forces. 32
-
- Concentration in the Atlantic
-
- As the debates over naval and air strategy showed, the British and
American staffs were preoccupied with different things and would disagree accordingly over long-term plans. But there was still
a great deal of common ground in the belief that the United States,
like Great Britain, had much more to fear from Germany than from any
of the other great powers. The importance of this for Army plans lay
in the willingness of the British to agree that U. S. Army forces
should be used "in areas which axe the most accessible to them,
namely in the general area of the Atlantic." 33
It was
entirely feasible to adjust British strategic plans with this policy,
for as the United States began to concentrate forces in the North
Atlantic area, the British Government would be free to continue
sending some additional forces to the Middle East and Far East.
-
- Even apart from reasons of strategic policy, the American staff had
a very strong reason for desiring such a solution. The concentration
of American forces in the Atlantic theater would enormously simplify
relations between British and American commands. Rear Admiral Richmond
Kelly Turner restated the principle, which had been contained in the
instructions drawn up and approved for the American delegation
- . . . that it is not the intention of the United States to agree to
any breaking up and scattering of United States forces into small
groups to be absorbed in the British commands . . . . The United
States proposes to accept full responsibility for operations in
certain definite areas, or for executing specific tasks in areas of
British responsibility . . . . In brief, United States forces are to
be under United States' command, and British forces under British
Command. . . 34
- [40]
- Only on this basis could the American staff hope to minimize the
vexing problems resulting from the gradual intrusion of American
forces into areas in which Great Britain had, and the United States
did not have, a large political and economic stake and a clearly
formulated policy, together with control of communications, a
monopoly of intelligence, and long experience in dealing with the
civil authorities.
-
- For these reasons the American staffs were eager to develop plans
for collaboration in the North Atlantic, and, since the British were
ready to join in the project, it was in this field of planning that
the conversations proved most fruitful. The tentative agreements
reached by the representatives dealt mainly with the disposition of
American forces up to the time of full American participation in the
war and for a few months thereafter. The general theory then was that
the United States should prepare to take over as far and as fast as
possible responsibility for defenses in the North Atlantic, except
in the British Isles.
-
- For the Navy this meant the assumption of responsibility for North
Atlantic convoys. The United States was already planning to begin very
soon to convoy ships all the way across the Atlantic. One of the first
agreements reached with the British regarding Atlantic operations
concerned the use of American forces if the United States should enter
the war
-
- The principal task of the naval forces which the United States may
operate in the Atlantic will be the protection of associated shipping,
the center of gravity of the United States' effort being concentrated
in the North Atlantic, and particularly in the Northwest Approaches
to the British Isles. Under this conception, United States' naval
effort in the Mediterranean will initially be considered of secondary
importance. 35
-
- For the Army, concentration in the Atlantic meant, to begin with,
the garrisoning of Iceland, in addition to the leased bases, and of
American naval bases in the British Isles. In the early stages of
American participation, the Army would establish air and ground forces
in Great Britain. American air strength in Great Britain would be used
not only to defend United States land and naval bases but also to take
the offense, in conjunction with the Royal Air Force, against German
military power. All these moves would relieve the pressure on the
British high command, allowing it to continue deploying forces to the
Middle East and Far East with far greater assurance.
-
- Exchange of Military Missions
-
- Besides reaching these tentative agreements, the British and
American representatives readily agreed to recommend the exchange of
military missions. The U. S. military mission in London recommended by
the conference was to consist of two members-a flag officer of the U.
S. Navy and a general officer of the U. S. Army with a secretariat
and staff organized in three sections-a joint planning section, a Navy
section, and an Army section. 36
The
- [41]
- British military mission in Washington would consist of three
members-a flag officer of the British Navy, a general officer of the
British Army, and an officer of the Royal Air Force-with a joint
planning staff, a Navy staff, an Army staff, an Air staff, and a
secretariat. The Dominions of Canada, Australia, and New Zealand would
be represented on the British mission in Washington by their service
attaches.
-
- Should the United States enter the war, these two missions were to
be announced as the representatives of their respective Chiefs of
Staff, and would then be set up, organized not only to collaborate in
formulating military plans and policies but also to represent their
own military services vis-à-vis those of the government to which they
had been accredited.
-
- At the conclusion of the agreements of ABC-1, recommendation was
made that "nucleus missions" be exchanged at once. The Army
War Plans Division (WPD) on 7 April 1941 recommended that the American nucleus mission be set up in London, separate from the
military attaches office, in order to avoid political or diplomatic
control, and that the general officer selected to head the mission be
a major general qualified to assume command of the first units of the
United States Army forces primarily antiaircraft and Air Corps-that
would be sent to the British Isles in case of war. General Marshall
gave his approval to the early establishment of the nucleus mission in
London, the senior Army member of which would be a major general designated the Special Army Observer, London, responsible directly
to the Chief of Staff. 37
Maj. Gen. James E. Chancy, the Air Corps
officer that had been sent to London to study British air defenses in
the fall of 1940, was selected for the post. He was instructed to
negotiate with the British Chiefs of Staff on military affairs of
common interest, specifically those relating to combined action by
American and British military officials and troops in British areas of
responsibility, but not with a view to making political commitments.
He was to try to arrange for American officials in England to take up
military matters with the British through his group and not
directly. 38
Admiral Ghormley, who had been in London as the
Special Naval Observer (SPENAVO) since the fall of 1940, received
similar instructions from Admiral Stark.39
On 19 May General
Chaney notified the War Department that he had established the Special
Army Observer Group (SPOBS) in London. 40
-
- Meanwhile the Navy Department had made office space available for
the few officers of the British military mission who were already in
Washington. On 18 May the
- [42]
- nucleus British military mission advised the War Department that the
heads of the British mission would be Admiral Sir Charles Little,
who had been Second Sea Lord and Chief of Naval Personnel; Lt. Gen. H.
C. B. Wemyss, who had been Adjutant General to the Army Forces; and
Air Marshall A. T. Harris, who had been Deputy Chief of the Air Staff.
These officers, with the remaining members of their staffs, would be
leaving the United Kingdom early in June and would set up their
offices in a leased house adjoining the British embassy in Washington.
41
-
- With the establishment of these "nucleus missions," the
exchange of views and information between the British and American
staffs became continuous, and the problems of coalition warfare came
to be a familiar part of the work of the Army planners.
-
-
- The strategy recommended by Admiral Stark and presented by the
American staff for discussion with the British assumed a situation
much like that proposed in the terms of reference for RAINBOW 5. 42
Once ABC-1 had received the approval of the Chief of Staff and the
Chief of Naval Operations, the Joint Board issued a new directive
for the preparation of RAINBOW 5, requiring that the plan be based on ABC-1 and on joint United
States-Canada War Plan 2 (ABC-22) which was then being drafted. 43
The first Army draft of RAINBOW 5 was completed on 7 April and three
weeks later the plan was submitted by the joint Planning Committee for
the Joint Board's approval.
-
- The general assumptions on which RAINBOW 5 was based, were as
follows:
-
- That the Associated Powers, comprising initially the United States,
the British Commonwealth (less Eire), the Netherlands East
- Indies, Greece, Yugoslavia, the Governments in Exile, China, and the
"Free French" are at war against the Axis Powers, comprising either:
- a. Germany, Italy, Roumania, Hungary, Bulgaria, or
- b. Germany, Italy, Japan, Roumania, Hungary, Bulgaria and Thailand.
- That the Associated Powers will conduct the war in accord with ABC-1
and ABC-22.
- That even if Japan and Thailand are not initially in the war, the
possibility of their intervention must be taken into account.
- That United States forces which might base in the Far East Area will
be able to fill logistic requirements, other than personnel,
ammunition, and technical materials, from sources in that general
region.
- That Latin American Republics will take measures to control
subversive elements, but will remain in a non-belligerent status
unless subjected to direct attack; in general, the territorial waters
and land bases of these Republics will be available for use by
United States forces for purposes of Hemisphere Defense.
-
- The broad strategic objective of the Associated Powers under this
plan would be the defeat of Germany and its allies. The national
strategic defense policies of the
- [43]
- United States and the British Commonwealth would be to secure the
Western Hemisphere from European or Asiatic political or military
penetration, maintain the security of the United Kingdom, and provide
such dispositions as would ensure the ultimate security of the British
Commonwealth of Nations. The strategy of the offensive against
Germany and its allies set forth in RAINBOW 5 (as in ABC-1) was as
follows
- (a) Application of economic pressure by naval, land, and air forces
and all other means, including the control of commodities at their
source by diplomatic and financial measures.
- (b) A sustained air offensive against German Military power,
supplemented by air offensives against other regions under enemy
control which contribute to that power.
- (c) The early elimination of Italy as an active partner in the Axis.
- (d) The employment of the air, land, and naval forces of the
Associated Powers, at every opportunity, in raids and minor offensives
against Axis Military strength.
- (e) The support of neutrals, and of Allies of the United Kingdom,
Associates of the United States, and populations in Axis occupied territory in resistance to the Axis Powers.
- (f) The building up of the necessary forces for an eventual
offensive against Germany.
- (g) The capture of positions from which to launch the eventual
offensive. 44
- American military operations would be governed by the following
principles:
- (a) Under this War Plan the scale of hostile attack to be expected
within the Western Atlantic Area is limited to raids by air forces and
naval surface and submarine forces.
- (b) The building up of large land and air forces for major offensive
operations against the Axis Powers will be the primary immediate
effort of the United States Army. The initial tasks of United States
land and air
- forces will be limited to such operations as will not materially
delay this effort.
- In accord with these principles the United States Army and Navy
would be required to assume the general tasks, in co-operation with
other Associated Powers, of defeating the Axis Powers and guarding
United States national interests by the following:
- a. Reducing Axis economic power to wage war, by blockade, raids, and
a sustained air offensive;
- b. Destroying Axis military power by raids and an eventual land,
naval, and air offensive;
- c. Protecting the sea communications of the Associated Powers;
- d. Preventing the extension in the Western Hemisphere of European or
Asiatic military powers; and by
- e. Protecting outlying Military base areas and islands of strategic
importance against land, air, or sea-borne attack 45
- The specific tasks assigned to the Army and the Navy under RAINBOW 5
were either already listed in ABC-1 or derived therefrom. In the
western Atlantic the Army (in conjunction with the Navy) would be
required to ,protect the territory of the Associated Powers, support
Latin American republics against invasion or political domination by
Axis Powers, provide defensive garrisons for Newfoundland, Bermuda,
Jamaica, Trinidad, St. Lucia, Antigua, and British Guiana, and defend
coastal frontiers and defense command areas. The Army would also be
responsible for relieving British forces in Curacao and Aruba, for
preparing to relieve Marine forces in the Azores and Cape Verde
Islands, if the Navy had established such garrisons, and for building
up forces in the United States for eventual offensive action against
Germany. The Navy in that area would be responsible for protecting the
sea communications of the
- [44]
- Associated Powers, for destroying Axis sea communications by
capturing or destroying vessels trading directly or indirectly with
the enemy, for protecting and routing shipping in the coast zones, and
for preparing to occupy the Azores and Cape Verde Islands if such an
operation became necessary.
-
- In the United Kingdom and British Home Waters Area, the U. S. Army
would co-operate with the Royal Air Force in conducting offensive
air operations aimed primarily against objectives in Germany, provide ground defense for bases in the British Isles used primarily
by United States naval forces, and provide a token force (one
reinforced regiment) for the defense of the British Isles. The Army
would also relieve the British garrison in Iceland as soon as
practicable. In British Home Waters, the Navy, acting under the
strategic direction of the British Commander in Chief of the Western
Approaches, would be responsible for escorting convoys. The Navy would
also be responsible for raiding enemy shipping in the Mediterranean
under British strategic direction.
-
- In the Pacific, RAINBOW 5 assigned to the Army the tasks of
protecting the territory of the Associated Powers, preventing
extension of Axis influence in the Western Hemisphere, and
supporting naval forces in the protection of sea communications and in
the defense of coastal frontiers and defense command areas. The Navy
in the Pacific Ocean Area would protect the sea communications of the
Associated Powers, destroy Axis sea communications, support British
naval forces in the area south of the equator as far west as
longitude 155° east, and defend Midway, Johnston, Palmyra, Samoa, and
Guam. The Navy would also be required to support the forces of the
Associated Powers in the Far East area by diverting enemy strength from the Malay Barrier through the denial and capture of
positions in the Marshall Islands and through raids on enemy sea
communications, while preparing to establish control over the
Caroline and Marshall Islands area. 46
-
- In the Far East, the Army would defend the Philippine coastal
frontier, but no Army reinforcements would be sent to that area. 47
The Navy would support the land and air forces in the defense of the
Far Eastern territories of the Associated Powers, raid Japanese sea
communications, and destroy Axis forces. The Commander in Chief,
United States Asiatic Fleet, would be responsible, in co-operation
with the Army, for the defense of the Philippines as long as that
defense continued and, thereafter, for the defense of the Malay
Barrier, but the Navy, like the Army, planned no reinforcement of
its forces in that area. 48
-
- RAINBOW 5, as drawn in April 1941, provided no plan for the
employment of land forces in a major offensive against Germany. Lt.
Col. Charles W. Bundy of the War Plans Division, taking note of this
omission, explained
-
- A great deal of consideration was given to the employment of major
land forces, but very correctly no plans for these land opera-
- [45]
- tions were formulated; a plan must be formulated upon a situation
and no prediction of the situation which will exist when such a plan
can be implemented should be made now. One of the principal policies
enumerated in Rainbow 5 is "The building up of the necessary
forces for an eventual offensive against Germany." 49
-
- RAINBOW 5 was based on the time origin of Mobilization Day (M Day),
which might precede a declaration of war or the occurrence of hostile
acts. As a precautionary measure, the War and Navy Departments
might put certain features of the plan into effect before M Day. The
shipping schedule for overseas transportation of Army troops had been
predicated on the assumption that M Day would not fall earlier than 1
September 1941. U. S. Army commitments to the British under ABC-1
would not become effective before that date. In the first few months
of the war, under RAINBOW 5, 220,900 troops and at least 666 aircraft
would have to be transported to overseas garrisons--44,000 troops to
Hawaii, 23,000 to Alaska, 13,400 to Panama, 45,800 to the Caribbean
area, and 26,500 to Iceland. By 1 November, 15,000 troops were
scheduled for shipment to antiaircraft and air defense installations
in the British Isles and to other permanent overseas naval bases in
foreign territory. By 1 February, 53,200 air striking forces,
including defense units, were scheduled for shipment to the British
Isles.
-
- On a very tentative basis, the Army had planned to prepare the
following forces for overseas employment; 24,000 troops and 80
aircraft for the west coast of South America; 86,000 troops and 56
aircraft for the east coast of South America; 83,000 troops and aircraft for transatlantic
destinations, prepared to embark 20 days after M Day; and, finally,
an expeditionary force of one army, two corps, and ten divisions,
prepared to embark 180 days after M Day. 50
-
- On 14 May, at its regular monthly meeting, the joint Board
approved RAINBOW 5 and ABC-1. 51
On 2 June, following approval by the
Secretaries of War and Navy, RAINBOW 5 and ABC-1 were sent to the
President, with the information that the British Chiefs of Staff had
provisionally agreed to ABC-1 and had submitted it to the British
Government for approval.52
The President read both documents and
on 7 June returned them to the joint Board without approval or
disapproval. Maj. Gen. Edwin M. Watson, the President's military
aide, offered the explanation:
-
- The President has familiarized himself with the two papers; but
since the report of the United States British Staff Conversations,
ABC-1, had not been approved by the British Government, he would not
approve the report at this time; neither would he now give approval
to joint Army and Navy Basic War Plan-Rainbow No. 5, which is based
upon the report ABC-1. However, in case of war the papers would be
returned to the President for his approval.53
- [46]
- At the meeting of the War Council in Stimson's office on 10 June,
the question came up of whether the President's not having approved
RAINBOW 5 might interfere with Army preparations. General Marshall
took the position that, although the Army did not know what changes
President Roosevelt might make, the President had not after all
disapproved the plan and the Army could go ahead on a tentative basis.
54
-
- The main task undertaken by the Army within the terms of ABC-1 and
RAINBOW 5 was planning for the first Army forces to be sent to the
United Kingdom. The preparatory investigations, studies, and
negotiations were complex and time consuming. Sites in Great Britain
that might be used for Army installations, including depots and air
bases, had to be inspected, and tentative arrangements made with the
British for their development. The organization of U. S. forces in Great Britain had to be outlined, the
positions of U. S. ground and air forces in the U. S. chain of command clarified, and command
relationships with the British
defined. The size and composition of the U. S. forces first to be sent
had to be determined. ABC-1 and RAINBOW 5, the starting points for
General Chaney's work, had provided, after U. S. entry into the war,
for the dispatch of a token force-a reinforced regiment-to help defend
the United Kingdom; ground and air forces to protect bases in the
British Isles used by the United States; a bombardment force to
conduct offensive operations against the objectives in Germany; and a
base force to contain the administrative establishments and supply and
replacement depots to serve all U. S. forces in the United Kingdom.
The War Department needed specific recommendations as a basis for
decisions about the command, strength, and location of American
forces that might be stationed in the British Isles, as well as their
supply, housing, and defense from air attack.55
On the basis of
Chaney's reports the War Department and GHQ, in the summer and fall
of 1941, went ahead with detailed studies and tentative arrangements
for sending troops to the British Isles. 56
-
- A comprehensive report submitted by General Chaney on 20 September
contained detailed recommendations for sending about
- [47]
- 107,000 men, exclusive of a reinforced division for Iceland. All
of the units would operate under British strategic direction. Material
support in the main would have to be drawn from the United Kingdom.
All, except the bomber force and the Iceland force, would be under
British tactical command. General Chaney recommended that a supreme U.
S. Army headquarters be established in England, and that this
headquarters exercise the functions prescribed in ABC-1 for the
Commanding General, U. S. Army Forces British Isles (USAFBI ) as well
as those of the United States Army member of the military mission. The
American commander would act as a theater commander and would be
responsible for seeing that American troops were used in accordance
with American strategic policy. 57
How far General Chaney's
specific proposals would govern action upon American entry into the
war remained dependent on a great many unpredictable contingencies
and on the resolution at that time of several disagreements. 58
-
-
- The War Department staff was most reluctant to establish any new
garrisons or expeditionary forces. By midsummer of 1941, as the
result of the Selective Service Act and the federalization of the
National Guard, the Army had, for the time being, plenty of
"bodies." By August 1941 the Regular, Reserve, National
Guard, and Selective Service components of the Army totaled about
1,600,000 officers and men. There were twenty-nine infantry divisions,
four armored divisions, two cavalry divisions, and a tactical air
force of about 200 squadrons and approximately 175,000 men.59
By
the end of 1941 only two additional divisions were activated-the 5th
Armored and 25th (Reserve) Infantry Divisions. The training of all
these units and their supporting elements was just beginning. The
shortage of materiel, particularly of new models
- airplanes, tanks, guns, and small arms ammunition-handicapped
training and impaired the immediate combat effectiveness of the
troops. New materiel needed by the
- [48]
- Army, planes and ammunition especially, was being diverted to the
British, and to the Navy and Marine Corps. The War Department was
consequently confronted with the problem of deciding whether to give
the pieces of equipment that were beginning to emerge from the
factories to soldiers in training or soldiers in the overseas
garrisons. 60
Since the needs of the latter were usually more
urgent, troops in training often had to make shift with old materiel,
or none at all. Even if all the troops had been ready and equipped,
they still could not be sent overseas immediately. Large numbers of
professional soldiers were needed as cadres in the United States to
train other soldiers, and sufficient shipping space was not available. Though combatant ships of the "two ocean"
Navy, troop transports, and cargo vessels were under construction, it
was clear that the movement of troops overseas would long be limited
for want of ships.61
-
- Given the acute lack of experienced soldiers and the heavy
competition for materiel, even the small-scale precautionary and
defensive deployment of Army forces in 1941 for garrison duty in the
Atlantic and Pacific put an almost unbearable strain on the
Army. 62
(See Chart 1.) At the time, the Army's mobilization problems were further complicated by
existing legislative restrictions on the sending of troops outside
the United States. Neither selectees nor National Guardsmen could be
sent outside the Western Hemisphere. It was, moreover, impracticable
to give these men overseas assignments even in the Western
Hemisphere, since the Army had to be ready to release them after
twelve months of service.
-
- The Army's difficulties were discussed repeatedly during the
spring and summer of 1941 in connection with plans to set aside
expeditionary forces and to garrison Iceland. Admiral Stark thought
it was more important at this time for the Army and Navy to prepare
and assemble a highly trained amphibious force than it was to prepare
a garrison for Iceland. The Admiral had in mind, of course, the
possibility that the President might, on very short notice, order the
Army and Navy to undertake an overseas expedition.63
Considering the Army's training and equipment problems, the War
Department planners did not look with favor on Admiral Stark's
suggested priorities of training, although they would have liked to
drop planning for Iceland, had it not been a commitment under ABC-1. 64
-
- On the same day that Admiral Stark
- [49]
- brought up his idea, the President directed the Army and Navy to
prepare a joint Army and Navy expeditionary force, to be ready within
one month's time to sail from United States ports for the purpose of
occupying the Azores. He declared in explanation that it was in
the interest of the United States to prevent non-American belligerent
forces from gaining control of the islands and also to hold them for
use as air and naval bases for the defense of the Western
Hemisphere.65
The Joint Board agreed that the operation would be
carried out by Army and Marine Corps troops, supported by a naval
force from the Atlantic Fleet, with 22 June 1941 set as a tentative
date for the departure of the expedition.66
Accordingly, the
staffs prepared a joint basic plan for the capture and occupation of
the Azores. 67
-
- The decision for an operation against the Azores was perforce to be
deferred when the President decided in early June to take the first
steps toward the occupation of Iceland by U. S. troops.68
In
accordance with instructions from the White House, General Marshall
directed his staff planners to prepare a plan for the immediate
relief of the British troops in Iceland. 69
-
- As a result of the presidential directives of the last week of May
and early June, the War Department planners realized that
expeditionary forces might be called for in any of several areas on
short notice. This possibility was brought home to them with still
greater forcefulness at a meeting on 19 June of the President with the
Chief of Staff and the Secretary of War. At this meeting the President
inquired whether it would be possible for the Army to organize a force
of approximately 75,000 men to be used in any of several theaters-for
example, in Iceland, the Azores, or the Cape Verde Islands. The Chief
of Staff and the Secretary of War. again called to the President's
attention that the Army could not, under existing legislative
restrictions, send forces outside the Western Hemisphere for any
extended period without completely destroying the efficiency of all
units directly or indirectly involved. General Marshall also pointed
to the risks involved in sending half-trained and poorly equipped U.
S. Army troops into any areas in which they might have to operate
against well-trained and completely equipped German units. 70
-
- Nevertheless, the move to Iceland was not to be called off. Upon
receiving an invitation from the Icelandic Government on 1 July, the
President directed Admiral Stark to move marines to Iceland at once,
and told him to arrange with the Army for the relief of the marines
and for sending whatever additional Army troops would be needed, in
conjunction with the British forces that remained, to guarantee the
security of Iceland. 71
By this time the idea
- [50]
- of immediately relieving the entire British garrison had been
abandoned. On 7 July 1941 the marines landed in Iceland. Immediately
thereafter a pursuit squadron with necessary service units was ordered
to Iceland as the first Army contingent.72
But it proved extremely
difficult to set up an Army force to relieve the marines. The passage
of legislation in August 1941 permitting the retention in service of
the selectees, Reserve officers, and the National Guardsmen still left
the problem of restriction on territorial service-a problem which
was to remain with the Army until Pearl Harbor brought a declaration
of war. 73
-
- In the end, the Army force deployed to Iceland during 1941 was to
number only about 5,000 men, the marines were required to stay to
swell the American garrison to 10,000 men, and only a token British
force was relieved for duty elsewhere. After weeks of strenuous staff
work had been completed in Washington, the second Army contingent
sailed on 5 September 1941 under the command of Maj. Gen. Charles H.
Bonesteel. 74
After taking into account the disruption in Army units
already caused by the organization of this force, General Marshall decided that the marines would not be relieved by Army forces
until 1942. 75
-
-
- In the early spring of 1941 German submarines were sinking ships
in the Atlantic so fast that the President seriously considered
ordering aggressive action by American warships in spite of the
evident risk that it would bring the United States into the war. He
finally decided not to take the chance and instead ordered into effect
the more cautious plan of having American ships merely report German
movements west of Iceland. 76
-
- While the question was under consideration, the Army planners had
to make up their own minds what decision would be wise. In keeping
with a suggestion by Mr. Hopkins that the President needed
professional military advice, General Embick, who had gone on leave
after the staff conversations with the British, was brought back to
Washington for a series of discussions with the President to
"inform him as Commander-in-Chief of national strategy for the
future, without regard to politics." 77
-
- At a conference with members of his plans staff early on the morning
of 16 April, General Marshall presented the problem and asked how he
should advise the President when he went with General Embick to the
White House later that day.
-
- If we have gotten to the point where we can no longer operate on a
peacetime status,
- [51]
- should we recommend a war status? Or is it of importance to do
something immediately? Is immediate action necessary?
-
- As General Marshall observed, the situation facing him as Chief of
Staff of the Army was embarrassing since, if the President should make
a decision at that time, anything that could be done immediately
would have to be done by the Navy and not by the Army-Army forces
would not be prepared for action until the fall. Secretary Stimson's
view, he reported, was that any military action at all by the United
States, in whatever locality-Iceland, Greenland, the Azores, or Martinique-should be
undertaken with an overwhelming force, and with
a high degree of efficiency, even if contact with enemy forces were
not imminent. General Marshall summed up the problem thus
-
- What I must be prepared to suggest is what should the President do.
What do we think should be done. Of course, the President is also
governed by public opinion. There are two things we must do: Begin the
education of the President as to the true strategic situation-this
coming after a period of being influenced by the State Department.
The other thing is does he have to make a decision now? We must tell
him what he has to work with. 78
-
- The plans staff worked on this problem during the morning of 16
April and presented its conclusions to the Chief of Staff before
noon. It evaluated Army capabilities as follows
-
- We are prepared to defend our possessions in the Western Hemisphere
and the North American Continent against any probable threat that can
be foreseen. Subject to the availability of shipping we can promptly
relieve British forces in Iceland and relieve Naval forces that may
undertake the occupation of the Azores or the Cape Verde Islands. We
can undertake, likewise subject to the limitation of shipping, any operations that may reasonably be
required in the Caribbean or in Northeast Brazil.
-
- So far as Army operations were concerned, the staff could only
advise the postponement of American entry into the war, declaring
- . . . it must be recognized that the Army can, at the present time,
accomplish extremely limited military support to a war effort and
from this point of view it is highly desirable that we withhold
participation as long as possible.
-
- On the other hand, the staff believed that it might well prove
sound, from a military point of view, to enter the war before the Army
could be of much use
-
- Upon the assumption, which appears reasonable, that the United
States will enter the present war sooner or later, it appears to the
War Plans Division highly desirable that our entry be made
sufficiently soon to avoid either the loss of the British Isles or a
material change in the attitude of the British Government directed
toward appeasement. 79
-
- It appeared from their study that the planners, despite their
caution, were in favor of early entry of the United States into the
war. General Marshall left no room for doubt. He asked the planners in
turn to express their personal opinions. Colonel McNarney answered
- . . . that anything that would tend to cause the fall of the British
Isles would tend to put the whole load on the United States. That it
is important that we start reducing the war making ability of
Germany. We do have a Navy in being and can do something. If we wait we will end up
standing alone and internal disturbances may bring on communism. I
may be called a fire-eater but something must be done.
- [52]
- Lt. Col. Lee S. Gerow and Colonel Bundy stated that they agreed
completely with Colonel McNarney. Col. Jonathan W. Anderson, although
in general agreement, was unwilling to take as strong a position as
the rest. 80
-
- General Embick strongly disagreed. The situation did not seem to him
so dangerous, in part because he did not believe that the loss of the
Middle East would be fatal, even though it would be a heavy blow to
the Churchill government. He acknowledged that should the United
States enter the war fewer supply ships would probably be sunk in the
Atlantic, and agreed that the loss of ships was a vital problem. But
he declared that he himself would not advise entering the war and
believed that to do so "would be wrong in a military and naval
sense" and unjust "to the American people." 81
-
- During the summer of 1941 the Army staff came around to the view
expressed by General Embick. The German attack on the Soviet Union,
launched on 22 June 1941, undoubtedly conditioned this change of view.
Even if the German forces were successful in reaching their major
objectives in the Soviet Union during the summer and fall of 1941 (as
American military intelligence considered probable), there was no
longer any serious danger of an invasion of the British Isles until
the spring of 1942, and until then the British position in the Middle
East would also be much better. 82
-
- The change in the situation had quite the opposite effect on the
views of the President and the British. The President decided to send
additional Army forces to positions overseas, in spite of the earnest
insistence of the War Department staff that the Army was not ready.
The British; for their part, relieved by the German attack on the
USSR, but at the same time anxious to forestall a possible
reorientation of U. S. Army efforts toward the Pacific, ceased to
dwell on the oft-repeated demand for American naval forces in the
Southwest Pacific and began to urge an early entry of the United
States into the war against Germany and the desirability of American
collaboration in the Mediterranean.
-
- The Atlantic Conference
-
- The changes in the positions of the British and American staffs
were evident in staff talks held during the Atlantic Conference in the
summer of 1941 between President Roosevelt and Prime Minister
Churchill, on board the USS Augusta and H. M. S. Prince of Wales
lying off Argentia, Newfoundland.83
On the military side, no agenda
had been prepared or views exchanged with the British before the
conference, nor had the President given the American staff authority
to make commitments.
-
- At this conference the American staff was given a reminder how
important it was to the British to hold their position in the Middle
East and gain control of the North African coast. On 3 July 1940,
shortly after the fall of France, the British neutral-
- [53]
- ABOARD THE H. M. S. PRINCE OF WALES during the Atlantic Conference.
Seated: President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston S.
Churchill. Standing, left to right: Harry Hopkins, W. Averell
Harriman, Admiral Ernest J. King, General George C. Marshall, Field
Marshal Sir John Dill, Admiral Harold R. Stark, and Admiral Sir Dudley
Pound.
-
- ized the threat of a hostile French Fleet in a naval action three
miles west of Oran at Mers-el-Kebir, but failed in an attempt to take
Dakar (23-25 September 1940) . They had held and defeated the Italians
in Libya (September 1940-January 1941) , but German intervention in
the Mediterranean created a more dangerous situation. German troops
landed in Africa in February 1941 and entered Libya at the end of March. Early in April the Germans
attacked in the Balkans, where
the Italians had been waging a futile campaign for several months. The
British had held their own against the Germans in Libya, but they had
been quickly overwhelmed in Greece and Crete. Whatever reasons Hitler
had had at the time for intervention in the Mediterranean, German
forces there represented a constant danger, which would
- [54]
- greatly increase if Soviet resistance were to collapse or the German
campaigns were to slacken on the Eastern Front.
-
- During the staff talks the British brought up explicitly for the
first time (on the military level) the possibility of employing
American troops in a combined operation in French North Africa and of
using American help to reinforce the Middle East. Through these
undertakings in particular, they believed that early American
intervention would entirely change the whole military situation. The
American staff thus began to become acquainted with the British notion
of what operations American intervention in the war would make
possible. At the same time they also learned of the general methods
by which the British Chiefs proposed to gain victory in Europe after
blockade, bombing, subversive activities, and propaganda had
weakened the will and ability of Germany to resist
-
- We do not foresee vast armies of infantry as in 1914-18. The forces
we employ will be armoured divisions with the most modern equipment.
To supplement their operations the local patriots must be secretly
armed and equipped so that at the right moment they may rise in
revolt. 84
- The emphasis on mobile, hard-hitting armored forces operating on the
periphery of German controlled territory and eventually striking
into Germany itself, rather than large-scale ground action to meet the
full power of the German military machine, was in accord with the
Churchillian theory of waging war on the Continent. 85
-
- During the conference the American military staff remained
noncommittal on the British proposals and strategic views. 86
But
after the conference the War Department prepared comments which
became the basis of a formal reply by the joint Board to the British
in the early fall of 1941. The War Department staff objected primarily
to the proposition that early American intervention would insure
victory-perhaps even a quick victory--over Germany. They took the
position that
- Actually we will be more effective for some time as a neutral,
furnishing material aid to Britain, rather than as a belligerent. Our potential combat strength
has not yet been sufficiently developed . . . . We should . . . build,
strengthen, and organize for eventual use, if required, our weapons of
last resort--military forces. 87
-
- The Joint Board, elaborating on this view, characterized as
"optimistic" the British conclusion that American
intervention would make victory not only certain but also swift, and
replied:
-
- While participation by United States naval forces will bring an
important accession of strength against Germany, the potential combat strength of land and air elements has not yet been
sufficiently developed to provide much more than a moral effect.
Involvement of United States Army forces in the near future would at
best involve a piecemeal and indecisive commitment of forces against
- [55]
- a superior enemy under unfavorable logistic conditions.88
-
- Lend-Lease
-
- By the middle of 1941 there was every reason to expect that the
adjustment of American national policy to the rapidly growing
requirements of a world conflict would demand of the U. S. Army
"a piecemeal and indecisive commitment of forces against a
superior enemy under unfavorable logistic conditions." This was
entirely consistent with the President's strategic policy, in which
the readiness of the U. S. armed forces was a subordinate
consideration. The main expression of American strategy was the
program evolved by the President during 1940 of aiding other nations
already defending themselves against military aggression. The first
stage in carrying out this policy was to supply them with munitions.
-
- The Lend-Lease Act of 11 March 1941 provided the basis for an
extension of the scope and a great increase in the scale on which the
President could execute this program. The Lend-Lease Act authorized
the President to furnish material aid, including munitions, to all
countries whose resistance to aggression was contributing to the
defense of the United States. The principal recipient of American aid, on
an ever greater scale, remained Great Britain. But the application
of the Lend-Lease Act to China later in the spring of 1941 was an
extremely important step in the clarification of American national
policy, since it evidently disposed of any remaining possibility
that the United States might be willing to acquiesce in the
accomplished fact of Japanese hegemony on the Asiatic mainland. 89
And the extension of the Lend-Lease Act to cover the Soviet Union,
formally announced in November 1941, was of great consequence as a
measure of the President's willingness to base American international
policy on the principle of the common international interest in
supporting resistance to armed aggression.
-
- The War Department participated in the development of the critical
aspect of the lend-lease program-the provision of munitions-but
only by providing technical advice and handling the machinery of
procurement and distribution.90
The one important connection
then established between the lend-lease program and the future
operations of the Army was the creation by the War Department of
several field agencies to supervise lend-lease traffic overseas.
Though they were specifically concerned with lend-lease operations,
some of them
- [56]
- were obviously of potential use as nuclei for U.S. Army theater
headquarters.
-
- In September 1941 the plans staff suggested to General Marshall
"the need for a United States military mission in any major
theater of war where lend-lease aid is to receive emphasis."
General Chaney's observer group in London was "expected, in
addition to other duties, to support the supply and maintenance
phase of Lend Lease activities in the United Kingdom." 91
The
staff recommended the appointment of special missions to do similar
work elsewhere. Similar proposals came from G-2 and from Maj. Gen.
James H. Burns, Executive Officer of the Division of Defense Aid
Reports.
-
- One such military mission had, in fact, already been established on
the other side of the world. In August 1941 the War Department had
charged Brig. Gen. John A. Magruder with facilitating the flow of
lend-lease materials to China. The first of the lend-lease missions,
the American Military Mission to China (AMMISCA), was the prototype
of missions sent elsewhere. 92
-
- The suggestion of sending special missions to all active combat
zones was soon put into effect. In October 1941 the War Department,
acting upon presidential instructions, established a military
mission for North Africa, where lend-lease munitions were being used
by British forces defending the Suez Canal. The task of this mission,
headed by Brig. Gen. Russell L. Maxwell, was supervising lend-lease activities,
including American supply
depots and maintenance facilities in support of British operations. 93
General Maxwell set up his
headquarters in Cairo
on 22 November 1941.
-
- Soviet entry into the war against Germany and Italy in June 1941
called for further extension of the lend-lease program. A series of
conferences was held by a U. S. mission headed by W. Averell Harriman
in London and by the Beaverbrook-Harriman mission in Moscow during
September 1941.94
The agreement reached at Moscow in terms of
munitions to be furnished the Soviet Union was incorporated in the
First (Moscow) Protocol. This accord was signed by Mr. Harriman, Lord
Beaverbrook, and Foreign Commissar Vyacheslav M. Molotov on 1
October 1941. A month later President Roosevelt and Marshal Joseph V.
Stalin endorsed the agreement.95
At the request of Harry Hopkins,
Col.
- [57]
- Philip R. Faymonville remained in Moscow to act as lend-lease
representative there. A military mission to the USSR was constituted
at the end of October 1941, under Maj. Gen. John N. Greely, but never
secured Soviet permission to go to Moscow. 96
-
- Another military mission assisted more directly in the dispatch of
lend-lease supplies to the Soviet Union. By agreement between the
British and Soviet Governments, their troops had entered Iran in
late August-Soviet troops had occupied the northern part and British
troops the southern part. Of the few routes left for sending
supplies to the USSR, the route via the Persian Gulf ports and Iran
was the most promising. The U. S. Military Iranian Mission, set up in
October 1941, under Brig. Gen. Raymond A. Wheeler, was assigned the
task of assuring the establishment and operation of supply,
maintenance, and training facilities for British, Soviet, and any
other operations in the general area of the Persian Gulf, including
Iran and Iraq. 97
He began operations in Baghdad on 30 November 1941.
Transporting supplies through Iran to the USSR ultimately proved to be
a critical lend-lease operation.98
-
- These missions, though their formal authority was much more
restricted and their prospects for developing into Army headquarters
were far more uncertain than those of the Chaney mission, had
nevertheless much the same kind of importance as agencies through which the War
Department began dealing with the
practical problems of several important overseas areas--terrain and
climate, transportation and communications, politics and
administration, the performance of American equipment, and the
treatment and behavior of American military personnel. The experience that the missions began to acquire in the fall of 1941
constituted an all too brief preparation for the tasks that the War
Department was to face in supporting and controlling its far-flung
overseas operations in World War II.
-
- Victory Program
-
- The most searching examination of long-range problems of strategy
made by the Army to date, came in the summer of 1941 when the War
Department staff undertook to estimate the size and composition of the
Army forces that would be required to defeat Germany. Until then the
American planners had only touched on the question of operations to
defeat Germany and had not developed the idea-stated by Admiral Stark
in November 1940-that large-scale land operations would be required.
In the summer of 1941 an attempt to analyze long-term requirements
for munitions, for inclusion in a comprehensive national armaments
program, raised the question of the ultimate size and composition of
the Army and, therefore, of the scale and type of operations it would
conduct. 99
- [58]
- Planning for American production of munitions had been continually
complicated for over a year by conflicts between the needs of the Army
and requirements resulting, at first, from British and French
purchases and, later, from lend-lease allocations. Future
conflicts were certain to prove far more serious, should the United
States enter the war. In July 1941 the President formally asked for an
estimate of the munitions requirements of the armed services to help
formulate a comprehensive national industrial plan.100
-
- The responsibility for carrying out the President's instructions
within the War Department, for both the Army's ground and air arms,
devolved initially upon the Army's War Plans Division. Its chief,
General Gerow, soon put forward his idea of the method to follow in
setting up industrial objectives
-
- We must first evolve a strategic concept of how to defeat our
potential enemies and then determine the major military units (Air,
Navy and Ground) required to carry out the strategic operations.
-
- General Gerow considered unsound the main alternative method-to
calculate the supply of U. S. munitions that would have to be added to
the production of potential Allies in order to exceed the production
of potential enemies. It would be folly, he declared, to assume that
"we can defeat Germany simply by outproducing her." He
continued, by way of example
-
- One hundred thousand airplanes would be of little value to us if
these airplanes could not be used because of lack of trained
personnel, lack of operating airdromes in the theater, and lack of
shipping to maintain the air squadrons in the theater. 101
To adjust ultimate production to a strategic concept of how to
defeat the nation's potential enemies, it was necessary to estimate
the "strategic operations" and "major military
units" that would be required to execute them. On this basis the
War Department proceeded to make its strategic estimates and to
calculate ultimate Army requirements for the initial "Victory
Program" of September 1941.
-
- Major Albert C. Wedemeyer played the leading role for the General
Staff in conducting Army-wide studies on requirements of manpower.102 He assembled estimates of the strength and composition
of task forces, of the theaters of operations to be established, and
of the probable dates at which forces would be committed. He thus
became one of the first of the Washington staff officers to attempt
to calculate what it would cost to mobilize and deploy a big U. S.
Army.103
-
- As a basis for estimating the munitions and shipping that the Army
would need, the Army planners calculated on an ultimate Army strength
of 8,795,658 men with "approximately 215 Divisions." Of the
over 8,000,000 men, about 2,000,000 were to be allotted to the Army
Air Forces. The planners accepted a supplementary study drawn up by
the Army Air Forces War Plans Division (AWPD), which looked forward as
far as 1945, when bombers with a "4,000 mile radius of
action" would be in quantity
- [59]
- production.104 The Army would consist largely of air, armored,
and motorized forces. Aside from the provision of service troops for
potential task forces, relatively little attention was paid to the
requirements of service troops in the build-up of overseas theaters.
According to the Army estimates, approximately 5,000,000 men would
eventually be moved overseas, requiring the maximum use of about 2,500
ships at any one time.105
-
- For purposes of estimating the Army's requirements, the planners
made five primary assumptions about U. S. national policy
- a) Monroe Doctrine: Resist with all means Axis penetration in
Western Hemisphere.
- b) Aid to Britain: Limited only by U. S. needs and abilities of
British to utilize; insure delivery.
- c) Aid to other Axis-opposed nations:
- Limited by U. S. and British requirements.
- d) Far-Eastern policy: To disapprove strongly Japanese aggression
and to convey to Japan determination of U. S. to take positive
action. To avoid major military and naval commitments in the Far East
at this time.
- e) Freedom of the Seas.106
-
- Other Army assumptions were that the principal theater of wartime
operations would be Europe and that the defeat of potential enemies,
among whom were listed Italy and Japan, would be "primarily
dependent on the defeat of Germany." For want of essential
equipment, U. S. field forces (air and/or ground) would not be ready
for "ultimate decisive modern combat" before 1 July 1943.
-
- In making its estimates the Army staff necessarily projected U. S.
military opera-
- [60]
- tions into the future, in the frame of reference of ABC-1 and
RAINBOW 5. The steps to be executed before M Day or the beginning of
hostilities required the United States to defend the Western
Hemisphere; reinforce the Atlantic bases, Alaska, and the overseas
garrisons; insure the delivery of supplies and munitions to Great
Britain and other friendly powers; and prepare U. S. troops for active
participation in the war. 107 Finally the "Brief"
outlined military operations, at first defensive and then offensive,
that would lead to victory over Germany once war had been declared.
Before the final ground operations were undertaken, overwhelming air
superiority in Europe would have to be achieved, utilizing to the full
air base facilities in the British Isles; enemy vessels would have to
be swept from the Atlantic and the North Sea; and the foundations of
German military power weakened by dispersion of enemy forces,
blockade, subversive activities, and propaganda. No specific
military measures for defeat of the potential enemy in the Far East,
Japan, were considered. In fact, the Victory Program envisaged neither
large-scale Army action against Japan, nor continued active Russian
participation in the war.
-
- When the Army planners spoke of blockade, propaganda, subversive
activities, air superiority, the
application of pressure upon Germany "wherever soft spots arise
in Europe or adjacent areas," and "the establishment of
effective military bases, encircling the Nazi citadel, they
appeared to be in accord with British strategic theory.108
However, there was a sign of an incipient divergence from British
theory-a belief that, sooner or later, "we must prepare to fight
Germany by actually coming to grips with and defeating her ground
forces and definitely breaking her will to combat." 109
Vague
as the Army strategic planners were about the preliminary preparations
and conditions, they were disposed to think in terms of meeting the
German Army head on.110
-
- The great disputed issues of wartime strategy had not been-as they
could not yet be-joined, much less resolved. As General Gerow
observed, the strategic estimates for the Victory Program calculations
were based upon "a more or less nebulous National Policy, in
that the extent to which our government intends to commit itself with
reference to the employment of armed forces had not yet been clearly
defined." 111 As a result, the War Department was free to as-
- [61]
- sume that a high priority would be given to gathering forces for
operations against the main body of the German Army. The Army
estimates did not allow for the contingencies that a higher priority
might be given to the lend-lease requirements of Great Britain and the
USSR; that the President might accede to the desire of the British to secure and exploit
their position in the Mediterranean; and that it might become
necessary to make good, with logistically very costly operations
across the Pacific, the strong political stand that the United States
was taking against Japan.
- [62]
- Page created 10 January 2002
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