Supreme Commander (62 page)

Leigh-Mallory adopted the plan as his own. Zuckerman convinced Tedder of its validity, and he in turn convinced Eisenhower. But Harris and Spaatz protested vigorously. Harris argued that Bomber Command, built for night raids and area bombing, could not achieve the accuracy required to hit marshaling yards. Tedder even accused him of juggling figures to prove that his airplanes could not hit the proposed targets.
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Spaatz insisted that the continuing success of operations against aircraft production facilities and oil refineries would assure great support for the objectives of both OVERLORD and POINTBLANK, while to turn from these targets to railways would allow German production to return to high output. He even convinced Arnold to change his mind and support him.
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Spaatz realized, as one of his intelligence officers reminded him, that he would have to make “a quick and decisive effort … to prevent the Strategic Air Forces being engulfed in the Zuckerman program,” that he would, in fact, have to come up with an alternative use of the bombers that would make a direct contribution to OVERLORD. Spaatz’s solution
was the “Oil Plan,” which gave first priority to the German oil industry, with emphasis on gasoline. This, he announced, would in the long run immobilize the Germans much more effectively than the Transportation Plan.
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The difficulty with Spaatz’s proposal was that it would have no immediate effect. The Germans had accumulated large stocks of oil in France and scattered them so that they were comparatively safe. Only when the stocks were used up—only, that is, after D-Day—would a stoppage of oil production affect Germany’s military operations. Spaatz shrugged off this point by saying that the Transportation Plan would be only of slight help in isolating the battlefield by keeping German reinforcements out of Normandy, while the Oil Plan would be of major help later.
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This was exactly the attitude to which Eisenhower objected and the crux of the matter: Spaatz assumed that it would be easy to get ashore and stay there, while Eisenhower did not. The Supreme Commander wanted any help he could get. The Transportation Plan promised some help for OVERLORD, while the Oil Plan offered none.

But it seemed that everyone’s first reaction to Zuckerman’s proposal was negative. Brooke doubted the effectiveness of the proposed attack. Doolittle pronounced it a waste of effort. More serious were Portal’s objections. He reminded SHAEF of a 1940 War Cabinet ruling which forbade air attacks on occupied countries if there were risk of serious damage to the population. Since it was estimated that the Transportation Plan would cause 80,000–160,000 French casualties, of which one fourth might be deaths, political approval seemed unlikely. Churchill and Eden both indicated that they could never give their blessing to such a large-scale attack against French targets.
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While Tedder worked to convince Portal, Eisenhower concentrated on Churchill. But the Prime Minister was as much concerned with organization as with targets. He did not want to give Eisenhower command of all the RAF in Great Britain, especially Coastal Command, which was responsible for the defense of the home islands, and he was much disturbed at the thought of Leigh-Mallory commanding Harris’ bombers. Eisenhower did some “long and patient explaining” to show that he had no interest in controlling Coastal Command. At a meeting with Churchill on February 28, Eisenhower said he was prepared to issue an order stating that he would exercise supervision of all air forces through Tedder, giving Tedder authority to use already existing air force headquarters to make his control effective. Under this system, Eisenhower emphasized, Leigh-Mallory’s “position would not be changed so far as
assigned
forces are
concerned but those
attached
for definite periods of definite jobs would not come under his
command
.”
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In other words, Eisenhower promised that if the CCS gave him command of the Strategic Air Forces, he would see to it that Leigh-Mallory was in effect out of a position of control.

Chruchill seemed to like the idea. Tedder, he said, could be the “Aviation lobe” of Eisenhower’s brain. Still, he ruled that “there can be no question of handing over the British Bomber, Fighter or Coastal Commands as a whole to the Supreme Commander and his Deputy.” He was willing to assign forces from those commands to Eisenhower as the need arose, but maintained that SHAEF air plans should be subject to CCS approval. Eisenhower strongly objected to submitting his plans to the CCS and “demurred at anything short of complete operational control of the whole of Bomber Command and the American Strategic Forces.” It seemed to Eisenhower that Churchill was reneging on what had been agreed upon as the supreme effort in Europe. If the British refused to make anything less than a full commitment to OVERLORD by holding back part of Bomber Command, Eisenhower told the Prime Minister, he would “simply have to go home.”

In reporting these developments to Tedder, Eisenhower warned that Churchill was “very impatient,” and he urged Tedder to “push conferences and planning.… Otherwise the P.M. will be in this thing with both feet.”
¹⁵
Churchill, alarmed at Eisenhower’s vehemence, conceded. He said he would accept whatever plan Portal and Eisenhower agreed upon.

Among them Eisenhower, Portal, and Tedder worked out a solution. They proposed that Tedder supervise all air operations for OVERLORD. Eisenhower, as Supreme Commander, and Portal, who was the CCS executive for POINTBLANK, would approve of the air program that Tedder developed. The key sentence in the draft directive the three men prepared read, “The responsibility for supervision of air operations out of England of all the forces engaged in the programme including U. S. Strategic and British Bomber Command together with any other air forces that might be available should pass through the Supreme Commander.” After OVERLORD had been “established” on the Continent the directive for the employment of the Strategic Air Forces could be revised.
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The BCOS accepted the proposal. Eisenhower was completely satisfied. He told Marshall, “I must say that the way it is now shaping up I am far happier than I was a week ago.”
¹⁷

Although Eisenhower described the new organization as “exactly what
we want,” and although everyone on the British side accepted it, opposition unexpectedly arose on the other side of the Atlantic. The JCS protested that the new proposal did not give Eisenhower “command” of the Strategic Air Forces. The British replied that Eisenhower had helped write and had already approved the proposal. They had objected to the word “command” and insisted that “supervision” was adequate. It suddenly struck Eisenhower that the British were going to back out, that he would not after all be given control of the bombers. He confessed himself “astonished” at the British reluctance to substitute the word “command” for “supervision,” for in his talks with Portal it had always been clear that command was in fact what was meant. “The question of exact terms and phraseology did not arise at that time,” Eisenhower reported to Marshall, “but it was clearly understood that authority for operational control of forces … should reside in me.” He recommended that Marshall find some word “that leaves no doubt as to the right of the Supreme Commander to control these air forces.…”
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The morning of March 22 Eisenhower dictated a memorandum for the diary. He recounted the history of his air problems, and by the time he got to the end he was so upset that he declared, “If a satisfactory answer is not reached I am going to take drastic action and inform the Combined Chiefs of Staff that unless the matter is settled at once I will request relief from this Command.” That same morning the British Chiefs were meeting. When Eisenhower heard the results of their deliberations he added a handwritten postscript to his memorandum: “I was told the word ‘direction’ was acceptable to both sides of the house. Amen!”
¹⁹

“Whether strategic bombers work on oil or transportation is a question up to Ike for determination,” Butcher noted on March 27.
²⁰
But it was not quite that simple. Eisenhower was still responsible to the CCS and, beyond that body, to Churchill and Roosevelt. He still had to take the views of Harris and Spaatz into account. Superiors and subordinates alike had to be shown that the Transportation Plan was feasible, and the politicians had to be convinced that the damage done in France would not leave a heritage of hatred. Some proof was already available. Portal had ordered a test, and on the night of March 6 Bomber Command carried out a raid against the railway center at Trappes. No planes were lost and civilian casualties were far lighter than opponents of the plan had predicted. Trappes itself did not function properly for a month. Somewhat gloatingly, Tedder noted that Harris had “underestimated the skill of his crews.”
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But Trappes was just a trial run that settled nothing definitely. Spaatz continued to argue against pulling his bombers off their targets inside Germany much before D-Day, since it would give the Germans too long to repair the damage at home. He grew almost frantic late in March, therefore, when Leigh-Mallory, exercising his jurisdiction over Ninth Air Force’s P-47 fighters, transferred them from escort duty with Eighth Air Force to the strafing of railroad targets in France. Spaatz complained to Eisenhower that without the P-47s as escorts his “deep penetrations will result in greatly increased heavy bomber losses and we will be losing many opportunities to deal punishing blows.…”
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Eisenhower called both Leigh-Mallory and Spaatz into his office, listened to both sides, and decided in favor of Spaatz. It was too early to begin the Transportation Plan, so “for the present” he gave Eighth Air Force first call on the fighters.
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The dispute illustrated that much remained to be settled. To thrash it out, Eisenhower called a meeting for March 25 at his headquarters. Portal, Spaatz, Harris, Leigh-Mallory, and Tedder would attend.

It was a dramatic confrontation. Eisenhower acted as chairman, listening judiciously to both sides, then making the final decision. Leigh-Mallory spoke first. The Strategic Air Force advocates had offered to participate in an interdiction program that would begin shortly before D-Day and would concentrate on line-cutting, strafing, bridge-breaking, and the destruction of a few railroad focal points. Leigh-Mallory wanted instead a prolonged attack on rail yards, sidings, stations, sheds, repair shops, roundhouses, turntables, signal systems, switches, locomotives, and rolling stock. This, he claimed, would destroy the German’s capacity to move reinforcements to the beachhead while interdiction would only prove to be a temporary irritant.

Tedder supported Leigh-Mallory. He emphasized the military maxim of concentration of effort. If the air forces had their way, Spaatz would have his bombers flying over Germany making precision attacks against oil targets, Harris would be engaged in area drops against cities, while Leigh-Mallory’s fighters worked over the battlefield. This was to him unsatisfactory. The Allies could derive full value from their immense air power, Tedder argued, only by selecting “one common object towards which all the available air forces can be directed.” He admitted that the Oil Plan would “ultimately produce grave effects on the whole German war effort,” but he did not think it could be done in time to assist OVERLORD.

Tedder cited other advantages to the Transportation Plan. It would retard the movement of supplies to the V-weapons launching platforms
in France, and it would force the Germans to move by road, where they would become targets for strafing. It offered a wide selection of targets. Since the Oil Plan had to be concentrated on a few sites, it often was hampered by bad weather, which would not be the case with the Transportation Plan. In sum, Tedder declared that the Transportation Plan “is the only one offering a reasonable prospect of disorganizing enemy movement and supply in the time available, and of preparing the ground for imposing the tactical delays which can be vital once the land battle is joined.”
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Spaatz rose to speak. It was a crucial moment in his life. He had begun his combat flying career in 1916 with the First Aero Squadron of the Mexican Punitive Expedition. As much as Harris, he was wedded to the doctrine that strategic bombing could win the war alone. He believed, according to the official historians of the AAF, that “the effects of such bombings [oil] on German industry and troop mobility on all fronts would be so drastic that the enemy high command might consider whether or not to oppose OVERLORD, or even to continue the war.”
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Graying around the temples, with a rather distinguished mustache and a wide, hard-set mouth, Spaatz was a poker player who enjoyed the good life. Extraordinarily efficient, with a sharp, incisive mind, he had an air about him of a man who was willing to indulge those who had not yet realized the true potentialities of the new weapons of war. Now Spaatz was happy to instruct them.

The Transportation Plan would not work, he began. At best, the Allies could reduce by thirty per cent the present efficiency of the enemy railroads, which was hardly sufficient. The Germans could make up that loss by cutting down on the food carried for the civilian population. On the other hand, fourteen synthetic oil plants produced eighty per cent of all German petrol and oil; by concentrating on them, Eighth Air Force could practically dry up the German supply. He therefore recommended continuing the destruction of the German Air Force (all agreed to this), an all-out attack against Axis oil production, and finally tactical support of OVERLORD beginning shortly before D-Day. This last should include “attacks in great strength upon communications and military installations of all kinds to assist to the maximum the initial phases of OVERLORD.” To cement his argument, Spaatz presented an order from a German quartermaster general of the high command which declared that since motor fuel was short every unit should economize whenever possible.