|
|
|
Biography At the outbreak of WWII he was a B-17 group commander with the 8th Air Force. By early 1942 he was a Lieutenant Colonel and directed the 305th Bomb Group into action over Europe. He was given command of the 3rd Bombardment Division in late 1942. He often demonstrated his courage by often leading his bombers on dangerous missions, including what many regard as the most dangerous mission ever flown - the Aug. 17, 1943 attack on the Regensberg, Germany ball bearing plant. The Air Corps lost 1,000 of the planes launched that day. A day that has gone down in Air Force history as "Black Thursday." Of the 291 B-17 planes involved in that raid, 60 were shot down, 5 crashed or were destroyed on return, 12 were scrapped as unrepairable, and 121 had to be repaired before they could be returned to flying status. Only 93 planes returned intact. The massive but ineffective raid on the ball bearing plant 500 miles inside enemy territory, the second of its kind and both conducted without fighter cover, outraged the American public and led the Air Corps to halt daylight precision bombing until Feb. of 1944. In July of 1944, LeMay transferred to the Pacific Theater. He was promoted to Major General and directed first the XX Bomber Command and then the XXI Bomber Command in India. LeMay soon concluded his bombers were dropping their bombs on or near their targets only 5% of the time, and losses of aircraft and crews was unsustainably high. LeMay became convinced that continued high-altitude, precision bombing would be ineffective, given the usual cloudy weather over Japan. He switched to low-altitude, incendiary attacks on Japanese cities. Precision bombing was conducted weather permitting only. LeMay conducted B-29 operations against Japan, including the massive incendiary attacks on 64 Japanese cities. This included the firebombing of Tokyo on March 9th and 10th, 1945. For the first attack LeMay removed the armaments on 325 B-29's, loaded each plane with firebomb clusters and ordered the bombers out at 5,000-9,000 feet over Tokyo. The first planes arrived over Tokyo just after midnight on March 10th. In a 3 hour period they'd dropped 1,665 tons of incendiary bombs killing more than 100,000 civilians and incinerating 16 square miles of the city. Precise figures aren't available but the firebombing and the nuclear bombing campaign against Japan, directed by LeMay between March 1945 and the Japanese surrender in August 1945, may have killed more than 1 million Japanese civilians. Official estimates from the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey put the numbers at 330,000 people killed, 476 injured, 8.5 million people made homeless, and 2.5 million buildings destroyed. "There are no innocent civilians, so it doesn't bother me so much to be killing innocent bystanders" The New York Times reported at the time, "Maj. Gen. Curtis E. LeMay, Commander of the B-29s in the entire Marianas area, declared that if the war was shortened by a single day the attack will have served its purpose." After WWII was over, LeMay was briefly transferred to the Pentagon. In 1947 he returned to Europe as commander of the USAF Europe, heading operations for the Berlin Airlift in 1948. The airlift went on for 11 months, bringing in 1.7 million tons of food and fuel to Berlin. In 1949, he returned to the U.S. to head the Strategic Air Command. He headed SAC until 1957, overseeing it into an efficient, all jet-force. In 1961 he was made Chief of Staff of the Air Force. He wasn't successful in this position, and he often clashed with the Secretary of Defense. LeMay was a belligerent dedicated anti-Communist. His first war plan, drawn up in 1949, called for the U.S. to drop all of its Atomic bombs on Russia in one massive strike. Due to his unrelenting militarism and what was widely perceived as his hostility towards the Secretary of State, LeMay was essentially forced in to retirement in Feb. of 1965, and seemed headed for a political career. His highest political accomplishment was his was his selection as the Vice President candidate on George Wallace's 1968 Independent Party ticket. When Wallace announced his selection in October of 1968, LeMay opined that, unlike many Americans, clearly did not fear using nuclear weapons. His saber-rattling did not help Wallace's bid for the Presidency. General Curtis LeMay died Oct. 1, 1990 and is buried in the United States Air Force Academy Cemetery at Colorado Springs, Colorado. Awards & Medals -
* Distinguished Service Cross
|
|
Copyright © 2007, 2008 WWII Remembered, All Rights Reserved
|
