WWW AFHISTORICALFOUNDATION ORG · SPRING 2008-Volume 55,Number 1 16 28 ... (Ret) Lt Gen Russell C. Davis, USAF (Ret) CMSgt Rick Dean, USAF (Ret) Lt Gen Marvin R. Esmond, USAF (Ret)

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SPRING 2008 - Volume 55, Number 1WWW.AFHISTORICALFOUNDATION.ORG

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The Things We Are: Air Force Heritage and History in ArtifactsJeff Duford

A Visionary Ahead of his Time: Howard Hughes and the U.S. Air Force—Part II: The Hughes D–2 and the XF–11Thomas Wildenberg

X–15B: Pursuit of Early Orbital Human SpaceflightL. Parker Temple, III

Chasing the XB–70A ValkyrieGeorge J. Marrett 42

Departments

Book Reviews

COVER: As crew members secure the X–15 rocket-powered aircraft after a research flight, the B–52 moth-ership used for launching this unique aircraft does a low fly-by overhead. (NASA photo.)

Features

Aviator of Fortune: Lowell Yerex and the Anglo-American Commercial Rivalry, 1931-1946By Erik Benson Reviewed by John Barnhill

No End in Sight: The Continuing Menace of Nuclear ProliferationBy Nathan E. Busch Reviewed by David J. Schepp

Spy Satellites and Other Technologies that Changed HistoryBy Thomas A. Graham & Keith A. Hansen Reviewed by Rick W. Sturdevant

The AEF Way of War: The American Army and Combat in World War IBy Mark Ethan Grotelueschen Reviewed by Jeffrey P. Joyce

Shadow and Stinger: Developing the AC-119G/K Gunships in the Vietnam WarBy William P. Head Reviewed by Steven A. Pomeroy

Farmans and SIAs: U.S. Army Aviation Training and Combat in Italy with Fiorello La GuardiaBy Jack B. Hilliard Reviewed by Thomas Wildenberg

Unconquerable Nation: Knowing Our Enemy, Strengthening OurselvesBy Brian Michael Jenkins Reviewed by Curtis Hooper O’Sullivan

Chronological Encyclopedia of Soviet Single-Engined Fighters 1939-1951By Herbert Léonard Reviewed by Carl J. Bobrow

On “Other War”: Lessons from Five Decades of RAND Counterinsurgency Research By Austin Long Reviewed by John L. Cirafici

Phantom Reflections: The Education of an American Fighter Pilot in Vietnam.By Mike McCarthy Reviewed by Stephen T. Ziadie

A Carrier at War By Richard F. Miller Reviewed by Curtis Hooper O’Sullivan

Flight from Fear and The OriginalsBy Sarah Bryn Rickman Reviewed by Janet Baltas

Marauder: Memoir of a B–26 Pilot in Europe in World War IIBy Louis S. Rehr with Carleton R. Rehr Reviewed by Herman Reinhold

Red Flag: Air Combat for the 21st Century By Tyson V. Rininger Reviewed by Lawrence Spinetta

The Last of a BreedBy Errol D. Severe Reviewed by Al Hopkins

LeMay: A BiographyBy Barrett Tillman Reviewed by William A. Rooney

Reflections of a TechnocratBy John McLucas Reviewed by William Shields

Books Received & Coming UpThe President’s MessageNews, and ReunionsIn MemoriamHistory Mystery

2 AIR POWER History / SPRING 2008

Board of Directors, 2007-2008Col Kenneth J. Alnwick, USAF (Ret)Lt Gen Richard E. Brown III, USAF (Ret)Lt Gen Russell C. Davis, USAF (Ret)CMSgt Rick Dean, USAF (Ret)Lt Gen Marvin R. Esmond, USAF (Ret)Gen Ronald R. Fogleman, USAF (Ret)Brig Gen Alfred F. Hurley, USAF (Ret)Maj Gen Silas R. Johnson, Jr., USAF (Ret)Lt Gen Timothy A. Kinnan, USAF (Ret)Mr John F. KreisMaj Gen Charles D. Link, USAF (Ret)Lt Gen Michael A. Nelson, USAF (Ret)Mr Jacob NeufeldGen John A. Shaud, USAF (Ret)Maj Lawrence Spinetta, USAFMaj Willard Strandberg, Jr., USAF (Ret)Col Jere Wallace, USAF (Ret)Col Darrel Whitcomb, USAF (Ret)

CORPORATE SPONSORS, 2007

Platinum Level ($20,000 or more)Lockheed Martin Corporation

Gold Level ($10,000 or more)EADS North America DefenseThe Boeing Company

Silver Level ($5,000 or more)None

Bronze Level ($1,500 or more)Air Force AssociationRolls-Royce North America

Officers, 2007-2008

President/Chairman of the Board andChair, Executive Committee

Lt Gen Michael A. Nelson, USAF (Ret) 1st Vice ChairmanGen John A. Shaud, USAF (Ret)2nd Vice Chairman and Chair,Development CommitteeMaj Gen Silas R. Johnson, Jr., USAF (Ret)Treasurer and Chair, Finance CommitteeLt Gen Richard E. Brown III, USAF (Ret)Chair, Membership CommitteeMaj Gen Charles D. Link, USAF (Ret)Chair, Services CommitteeMaj Willard Strandberg, Jr., USAF (Ret)Chair, Technology CommitteeVacantPublisherBrig Gen Alfred F. Hurley, USAF (Ret) Secretary and Executive DirectorCol Tom Bradley, USAF (Ret)

Contributing Members, 2007

The individuals and companies listed are contributingmembers of the Air Force Historical Foundation. TheFoundation Directors and members are grateful fortheir support and contributions to preserving, perpetu-ating, and publishing the history and traditions ofAmerican aviation.

Lt Col (Dr) Robert S. Barmettler, USAF (Ret)Mr and Mrs Lawrence BensonLt Col and Mrs Maynard Y. Binge, USAF (Ret)Maj Gen and Mrs Richard T. Boverie, USAF (Ret)Mr Joel K. CaultonGen and Mrs John T. Chain, Jr, USAF (Ret)Mr and Mrs James L. ColwellLt Gen John B. Conaway, USAF (Ret)Brig Gen and Mrs James L. Crouch, USAF (Ret)Brig Gen and Mrs Alfred F. Hurley, USAF (Ret)Col Joseph A. Marston, USAF (Ret)Maj Gen and Mrs David V. Miller, USAF (Ret)Col and Mrs Kenneth L. Moll, USAF (Ret)Gen James P. Mullins, USAF (Ret)Lt Gen and Mrs Michael A. Nelson, USAF (Ret)Lt Gen William R. Nelson, USAF (Ret)Mr and Mrs Jacob NeufeldCol Helen E. O’Day, USAF (Ret)Col J. C. Shahbaz, USAF (Ret)Gen John A. Shaud, USAF (Ret)Mr William L. ShieldsCol and Mrs Charles B. van Pelt, USAF (Ret)Col and Mrs Jere T. Wallace, USAF (Ret)

The Journal of theAir Force Historical FoundationSpring 2008 Volume 55 Number 1

PublisherAlfred F. Hurley

EditorJacob Neufeld

Technical EditorRobert F. Dorr

Book Review EditorScott A. Willey

Layout and TypesettingRichard I. Wolf

AdvertisingTom Bradley

CirculationTom Bradley

Air Power History (ISSN 1044-016X) is produced in March, June, September,and December by the Air Force HistoricalFoundation.

Prospective contributors should consult theGUIDELINES FOR CONTRIBUTORS atthe back of this journal. Unsolicited manu-scripts will be returned only on specificrequest. The Editor cannot accept responsi-bility for any damage to or loss of the man-uscript. The Editor reserves the right toedit manuscripts and letters.

Address Letters to the Editor to:

Air Power History11908 Gainsborough Rd.Potomac, MD 20854e-mail: [email protected]

Correspondence regarding missed issuesor changes of address should be addressedto the Circulation Office:

Air Power HistoryP.O. Box 790Clinton, MD 20735-0790Telephone: (301) 736-1959Fax: (301) 981-3574e-mail: [email protected]

Advertising

Tom BradleyP.O. Box 790Clinton, MD 20735-0790(301) 736-1959; fax (301) 981-3574e-mail: [email protected]

Copyright © 2008 by the Air ForceHistorical Foundation. All rights reserved.Periodicals postage paid at Hanover, PA17331 and additional mailing offices.

Postmaster: Please send change ofaddress to the Circulation Office.

The Air Force Historical Foundation

Air Force Historical FoundationP.O. Box 790

Clinton, MD 20735-0790(301) 736-1959 Fax (301) 981-3574

E-mail: [email protected] the Web at http://www.afhistoricalfoundation.org

Contributing Members (continued)

Col and Mrs Darrel D. Whitcomb, USAFR (Ret)43-E Association (Aviation Cadet Class 43-E)

3AIR POWER History / SPRING 2008

While many readers enjoyed the “Living Legends” symposium featured in the Winter2007 special edition, we also received several letters, e-mails, and telephone calls inquiringabout Tom Wildenberg’s series on “Howard Hughes and the Air Force,” which began in theFall 2007 issue of Air Power History. The sequence was interrupted by the time-sensitivenecessity to publish the Sixtieth Anniversary of the United States Air Force commemora-tive. Readers will be pleased to find Part II of the Hughes series continued in this issue. Itwill conclude with Part III this summer.

In his article, “The Things We Are: Air Force Heritage and History in Artifacts,” JeffDuford first distinguishes between the characteristics of history and heritage and thendemonstrates their connectedness through artifacts. Using narrative and photographs, hemakes a convincing case for the enduring value of the Air Force’s material culture.

Drawing on archival material from the National Aeronautics and Space Administrationand newly-released documents from other sources, Parker Temple examines North Ame-rican Aviation’s X–15B spaceplane in the context of early orbital human spaceflight. Al-though the X–15B never left the drawing board, it is interesting to consider “what mighthave been” had the nation pursued that direction into space.

In the fourth article, drawn from his forthcoming book, test pilot George Marrett des-cribes the thrilling experience of flying chase behind the Mach 3 North American AviationXB–70 Valkyrie. The story centers on June 8, 1966 and the crash of the XB–70 number two.

Last year, in its enduring quest to demonstrate the relevance of history, the Air ForceHistorical Foundation created two new awards: The General Carl A. “Tooey” Spaatz Awardfor individuals who contributed most to making Air Force history and the Maj. Gen. I.B.Holley Award for individuals who contributed most to recording it. The first honorees wereGen. David C. Jones, USAF (Ret.) and Maj. Gen. (Dr.) I. B. Holley, USAF (Ret.), respective-ly.The Foundation invites members to nominate candidates for this year’s awards. For nom-ination rules and criteria, see pages 62-63.

Also, Lt. Gen. Michael A. Nelson, president of the Foundation, invites readers to take uptheir pens or keyboards and share their ideas concerning the value of history. We intend topublish and post the most compelling ones. See pages 60-61.

The balance of this issue includes our familiar book reviews and departments. Here, too,readers have the opportunity to review a book or submit items of current interest.Applicable addresses and points of contact appear throughout.

From the Editor

Air Power History and the Air Force Historical Foundation disclaim responsibility for statements,either of fact or of opinion, made by contributors. The submission of an article, book review, or othercommunication with the intention that it be published in this journal shall be construed as prima facieevidence that the contributor willingly transfers the copyright to Air Power History and the Air ForceHistorical Foundation, which will, however, freely grant authors the right to reprint their own works,if published in the authors’ own works. In the case of articles, upon acceptance, the author will be sentan agreement and an assignment of copyright.


The Things We Are: Air Force He

AIR POWER History / SPRING 2008 5

Jeff Duford

eritage and History in Artifacts

The recent celebration of the United States AirForce’s sixtieth anniversary gives us pause toreflect on its rich heritage and history, which

appears in many places and forms. We see it inmarching formations and sharp salutes. We hear itin the words of our veterans and in the Air ForceSong. We smell it in JP fuel fumes and feel it in theheat and the cold of the global environment whereAir Force people operate. We read it in compellinghistories and accounts.These all provide connectionsto those who have come before and to those who areadding to the story of the Air Force now. Yet, there isanother powerful form of heritage which is uniqueand enduring—artifacts. Our heritage and historyalso reside in the Air Force’s national collection ofartifacts, which preserves our legacy while educat-ing and inspiring current and future generations.

What are “heritage” and “history?” They aresometimes used interchangeably, but do they reallyhave the same meaning? According to Webster, her-itage is “something transmitted by or acquired froma predecessor: inheritance, legacy.”1 For the AirForce, that “something” includes cultural traditionslike symbols and values that find their beginningsfar in the past. Webster defines history as “a branchof knowledge that records and explains past eventsas steps in the sequence of human activities.”2 In asense, history lays out a series of causes and effectsthat together explain how we got to where we aretoday. Though related, heritage is not history andhistory is not heritage. Both, however, make us feelpart of something much bigger than ourselves byadding the element of time. The Air Force todaynumbers more than 200,000 people, but if you mul-tiply it over time, the Air Force numbers millions.These millions of people share similar values andtraditions, and they have served and sacrificed formany of the same ideals over the decades. Objectsoften embody these values, traditions, and ideals.

There is an intuitive and nearly universal urgeto respect and preserve artifacts that goes farbeyond their inherent utility and financial value.How often does someone say, “that should be in amuseum?” Moreover, artifacts are certainly appre-ciated by many as interesting curiosities to look at.But why are they important and how are they use-ful? There is an entire field of inquiry called mate-rial culture studies which seeks to answer thesequestions.3 Thomas Schlereth, an importantscholar of material culture, defines the field as“…the study through artifacts (and other pertinenthistorical evidence) of the belief systems—the val-ues, ideas, attitudes, and assumptions—of a partic-ular community or society, usually across time.” He

also adds, “The common assumption underlyingmaterial culture research is that objects made ormodified by humans, consciously or unconsciously,directly or indirectly, reflect the belief patterns ofindividuals who made, commissioned, purchased,or used them, and, by extension, the belief patternsof the larger society of which they are a part.” 4 Thestudy of material culture allows us to better under-stand who we are and where we came from.

Artifacts have many traits, some unique, thatilluminate our heritage and history. First, artifactsprovide a direct physical connection with the her-itage and history of the Air Force. George Kubler,an art historian, once wrote “…inanimate thingsremain our most tangible evidence that the oldhuman past really existed…” 5 Events are transi-tory, but objects made and used by people duringthese events have a unique longevity that extendsfar beyond human lifetimes. Second, artifacts are aphysical record of the many varied types of history,such as military, technological, and social history,and they function as primary sources to be studiedfor information. Third, artifacts can evoke a rangeof powerful emotions like pride, awe, anger, respect,shock, joy, and surprise. Fourth, artifacts make usask questions that we might not otherwise ask.Lastly, they can reveal what we believe, both intheir material properties, such as how they aremade and what they are made of, and in the storiesof which they are a part. Sometimes, these traitsare so obvious they are easily overlooked.Ultimately, artifacts always lead back to people andtheir stories, and many objects connected to the AirForce are certainly evocative. This article presentsa small selection of objects from the Air Force’snational collection which illustrates how artifactspreserve our heritage and history.

Coal Briquette

A lump of coal is the proverbial example ofsomething without worth. Furthermore, it is inher-ently uninteresting to look at. But this particularcoal briquette is connected to a seminal event in theAir Force’s history, and therefore, it has great value.

Coal, not food, became a critical bottleneck dur-ing the 1948-1949 Berlin Airlift. Bringing enoughcoal into West Berlin became essential for theUnited States to win the first major engagement ofthe Cold War (and the first for the Air Force as aseparate service). Without coal for industry andutilities, the Soviet attempt to besiege West Berlininto submission with a land blockade might havesucceeded.6


Jeff Duford has been an historian/curator at the National Museum of the United States Air Force since1998. In that time, he curated numerous exhibits (including the Museum’s Korean War Gallery), workedclosely with the Museum’s Restoration Division on several aircraft projects, interviewed for national andinternational television productions (most recently the History Channel series Dogfights), and helpeddevelop a rationalized aircraft layout and storyline for a substantial recreation of the Museum’s exhibitgalleries. He is currently working on the restoration of the Memphis Belle and co-curating a major revi-sion of the Museum’s Southeast Asia War Gallery. Mr. Duford received a B.A. in history from MadonnaUniversity in 1995 and a M.A. in history from Eastern Michigan University in 1997.

(Overleaf) A pair of RF–86Fcameras on display.

A LUMP OFCOAL IS THEPROVERBIALEXAMPLE OFSOMETHINGWITHOUTWORTH…THIS PARTICULARCOAL BRIQUETTEIS CONNECTEDTO A SEMI-NAL EVENTIN THE AIRFORCE’S HISTORY,AND THEREFORE,IT HASGREATVALUE

This coal was mined in the Ruhr Valley, formedinto a 4-inch long briquette, and sent by train toFassberg Airfield, West Germany. There it wasloaded onto a USAF C–54 transport piloted by 1stLt. Richard Roberts and flown into West Berlin’sTegel Airfield. Though the aircraft were normallyswept clean, this piece was overlooked, and Lt.Roberts kept it as a memento. The natural urge topreserve objects is evident in the letter that accom-panied his donation of this and other artifacts:“These items have always meant a great deal tome, but after my visit to the museum, I feel theywill have a much better home there.”7 It seems thatRoberts felt a responsibility to make these objectsavailable for the others to enjoy, too.

This simple artifact is a tiny remnant of the1,421,118.8 tons of coal the USAF flew into WestBerlin during the Berlin Airlift and an enduringrecord of a key historical event that has long sincepassed.8

A–2 Jacket

First entering service in 1931, the leather A–2jacket is an iconic symbol of esprit de corps for air-crews. One characteristic design feature of A–2jackets are the front pockets—they do not have sideopenings, thereby preventing wearers from looking“unmilitary” by standing around with their handsstuffed in the pockets.

Although the Army Air Forces officiallyreplaced the A–2 with the cotton-twill B–10 jacketin 1943, it continued to issue A–2s from existingstocks. The A–2 saw widespread service duringWorld War II, and many wearers decorated theirA–2s with artwork, showing the individuality char-acteristic of American culture (juxtaposing the uni-formity of traditional military culture). After thewar, the AAF sold some as surplus, and the A–2also saw combat during the Korean War. The AirForce officially reinstated the A–2 in 1987, and it isstill worn as a uniform item today. 9

This particular A–2 is part of an historical event.First Lt. Carl Fraser, a radar operator on an F–82G,wore it when he and the pilot, 1st Lt. William Hud-


(Above) Coal being loadedonto a C–54 at FassbergAirfield during the BerlinAirlift.

(Above right) Berlin Airliftcoal briquette.

Lieutenant Fraser’s A–2jacket.

Lieutenants Fraser (left)and Hudson (right) in frontof an F–82.

son, shot down a North Korean Yak–11 to achieve thefirst kill of the Korean War on June 27, 1950. Inter-estingly, the patches on the jacket are contradictory.The patch on the left in the photograph expressesindividuality and impudence—it is an unofficialpatch for his flight with the irreverent phrase “Bite‘em in the butt.” The patch on the right is the officialemblem of his unit, the 68th Fighter InterceptorSquadron, and it represents uniformity and honor.10

Gee Whizz Test Sled

The Air Force has a tradition of being on thecutting edge of human knowledge, along with priz-ing “service before self.” The story of this artifact,the Gee Whizz test vehicle, highlights both of thesevalues.

In the late 1940s and 1950s, Lt. Col. JohnStapp headed a low-budget program to determinethe limits of the human body with respect to high gforces in order to design better ejection seats andsafety harnesses. The Gee Whizz, the program’sfirst test vehicle, was a rocket-powered sledequipped with very powerful hydraulic brakes thatraced along a 2,000-ft track.

This object, like others, leads back to storiesabout people, and Stapp’s courage and brillianceare truly inspiring. Not only did he head the pro-gram, he used his own body as test subject (alongwith other volunteers) in the Gee Whizz and latertest sleds. Stapp was not a thrill-seeker; he feltstrongly that he should share the program’s risks.


(Above) Colonel Stapp dur-ing one of the Gee Whizzruns. The enormous strainof the test is evident.

(Above right) ColonelStapp on the Gee Whizz.

(Below) General LeMaybeing sworn in as the Chiefof Staff on June 30, 1961.

(Below right) GeneralLeMay’s service coat.

Stapp suffered several injuries on the many testruns he took, including concussions, two brokenwrists, cracked ribs, lost fillings, and retinal hem-orrhages. In 1956, after reaching 632 mph onanother test sled, he was ordered to stop takinghigh-speed runs.11

The knowledge gained from Stapp’s programsaved countless lives not only in the Air Force, butalso in the general public through its incorporationin automobile safety.

Service Dress Coat

This service dress coat from the 1950s/1960s isan artifact that has obvious meaning within an AirForce context. The fact that it is a uniform itemworn by thousands of airmen says something about“uniformity” within Air Force culture, which is bothinclusive and exclusive at the same time. Forinstance, those who wear the uniform are part ofthe military, but the blue color makes it clear theyare not part of the U.S. Army. On the service coat isthe rank of general, senior pilot wings, and severaldecorations. The fact that one’s rank, abilities, andachievements are worn as part of the dress alsoreflects an ordered society with defined roles andstatus for individuals, which of course, the AirForce is.

This service dress coat was worn by Gen.Curtis E. LeMay, a legendary figure who arguedforcefully for air and space power and particularlyfor a strong strategic air and space force. LeMaycommanded Strategic Air Command for nearly tenyears during a critical period of the Cold War. From

1957-1961 he was Vice Chief of Staff of the USAF,and from 1961-1965 he was the Chief of Staff of theUSAF. The Air Force places great value on leader-ship, and this very personal artifact is a direct linkto a person who was an exemplary Air Forceleader.12

Baseball Cap

First Lt. Samuel Dickens, an RF–86 pilot in the15th Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron in the1950s, owned this baseball cap. The hat is yellow toreflect the squadron’s color, and the hash marks onthe brim account for the combat missions he flew in1953 during the Korean War. Dickens carried thiscap in his flight suit pocket or on the cockpit flooron every mission. This provenance alone wouldmake this artifact valuable, but there is more tothis story.

Dickens also carried this cap on a highly-clas-sified reconnaissance flight over Soviet airfieldsnear Vladivostok on April 3, 1954.13 From 1954-1956, a handful of 15th TRS RF–86F pilots flewover areas in the eastern USSR and communistChina on orders from President Eisenhower. Thesepilots were mainly lieutenants and captains whohad a tremendous amount of responsibility fortheir rank—any mistake might have created a seri-ous international crisis. The photographs they tookfilled critical intelligence gaps regarding commu-nist strategic military activities in the Far East.14

Very few artifacts remain from these missions—not surprising considering it was such a small groupof people and such a secret operation (the overflightsremained classified into the late 1990s). This capremains a tangible link to the audacity and skill ofthat small group of young aviators.


(Above) Lieutenant Dickenswearing the cap just beforethe first RF–86F overflighton March 22, 1954. On thismission, he flew a backupaircraft and turned aroundbefore crossing the Sovietborder.

(Above right) Dickens’baseball cap.

THE HASHMARKS ONTHE BRIMACCOUNTFOR THECOMBAT MISSIONS HEFLEW

SM-68B/LGM-25C Titan II

Declared operational in 1963, the aptly-namedTitan II was an intercontinental, liquid-fueledstrategic missile with a range of over 9,000 miles.15

The Museum’s Titan II is third from the left in thisphotograph of the Missile Gallery. An excellentexample of the inherent flexibility of air and spacepower, this artifact represents three importantaspects of the Air Force’s heritage and history:

The Titan II was a key deterrent against Sovietattack. Nuclear deterrence was the linchpin of U.S.defense during the Cold War. It rightly presumedthat the Soviet Union would not strike the U.S. ifits own obliteration would result. Serving withStrategic Air Command, the 54 Titan IIs were theU.S.’s first ICBMs with storable fuels and the firstto be launched from inside a silo, making themmore likely to survive an attack and to launch arapid response in return.16

A second aspect of the Titan II highlights theAir Force’s participation in manned spaceflight.Gen. Bernard A. Schriever encouraged the applica-tion of proven ICBM technology to sending peopleinto space. A modified version of the Titan II suc-cessfully flew as a launch vehicle for the Geminiprogram, and the Air Force provided facilities,launch specialists, and pilots for it.17


Overhead view of theMuseum’s Hall of Missiles.The Titan II is third fromthe left.

Titan II being launchedfrom inside a silo on a testshot.

THE TITAN IIHIGHLIGHTSTHE AIRFORCE’SPARTICIPA-TION INMANNEDSPACE-FLIGHT[USING] ICBMTECHNOL-OGY TOSEND PEOPLE INTOSPACE

Lastly, the Titan II and later-series Titan IIIand Titan IV rockets became reliable lift vehiclesfor many important satellite programs, such as theDefense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP),Defense Satellite Communications System (DSCS),Defense Support Program (DSP), Milstar SatelliteCommunications System, the Wideband Gap-fillerSystem (WGS), and overhead reconnaissance satel-lites. These satellites provided significant newcapabilities to the Air Force and the Nation.18

A–1E Skyraider

The Skyraider was originally developed for theU.S. Navy in the 1940s, but the Air Force acquiredlarge numbers of them for use in the War inSoutheast Asia. This World War II-era aircraftseemed anachronistic in the jet age, but it proved tobe an excellent close air support platform that wasrugged, could carry a lot of ordnance, and had along loiter time.

The story of this A–1E Skyraider involves thehighest ideals of bravery and intrepidity—a Medalof Honor. It is also an excellent reminder of the loy-alty expressed in the Airman’s Creed, “I will notleave an Airman behind.”

On March 10, 1966, six A–1Es, including thisaircraft flown by Maj. Bernard Fisher, were provid-ing close air support to a Special Forces outpostbeing overrun in the A Shau Valley. After theenemy had taken the airstrip and ringed it withAAA, a Skyraider piloted by Maj. Dafford “Jump”Myers took a hit that shut down the engine. Myerscrash-landed on the airstrip, but since the nearestrescue helicopter was 20 minutes away, his situa-


(Right) Fisher’s A–1E.

(Below) Majors Fisher (left)and Myers (right) picturedafter the daring rescue.

THESKYRAIDERWAS ORIGINALLYDEVELOPEDFOR THE U.S.NAVY

tion appeared hopeless. Incredibly, Fisher landedthis A–1E on the strip and taxied up and downlooking for him. As he weaved around debris andtorn-up steel planking, Fisher saw Myers andstopped. Myers jumped on the wing and Fisherhelped pull him into the cockpit, after which theytook off, saving Myers from a horrible fate at thehands of the enemy.19

Flight Helmet

Sergeant Kenneth Felty, an illuminator opera-tor (or IO), wore this flight helmet while on his sev-entieth AC–130 combat mission in Southeast Asiaon May 12, 1972. He and the crew of AC–130E 69-6573 were providing vital support to friendly forcessurrounded and besieged at An Loc, SouthVietnam, during the communist EasterOffensive.20 Air Force close air support and tacticalair resupply proved essential in preventing a totalrout, while a new and deadly weapon, the shoulder-fired SA-7 surface-to-air missile, presented a seri-ous threat.21 As Felty was bent over the open rearramp spotting for AAA fire, an SA-7 hit the aircrafta few feet away from him, spraying fragmentsthrough the back compartment. Fortunately, hishelmet took the brunt of the force.

This artifact certainly evinces an emotionalreaction. The blast carried away part of the facemask, and peppered the helmet with about 40 frag-ments. Three of these penetrated and woundedFelty (thankfully he recovered from these and


(Above right) Photographof the damage the SA-7caused to Felty’s AC–130.

(Below) Felty’s helmet.

SERGEANTFELTY WORETHIS FLIGHTHELMET ONHIS SEVENTIETHAC–130 COMBATMISSION

other fragment wounds). The helmet is a soberreminder of the danger our Air Force personnel facein the performance of their duties.22

A–4 Flying Suit

The A–4 flying suit was a common summerclothing item made of olive drab gabardine. Firstissued in 1930, it was officially replaced by thelighter-weight AN-S-31 flying suit in 1943. Even so,the A–4 continued to be used in large numbersafter World War II and into the Korean War.23

This A-4 has an extraordinary story that spansan important change in both the Air Force’s and thenation’s history. Lieutenant Haldane King, Sr. worethis A–4 while flying a B–25 in the segregated477th Bombardment Group (Medium). King, alongwith the other Tuskegee Airmen, had to fight prej-udice in order to fight for their country. Three years


(Above) A–4 suit from theKing family on display atthe National Museum of theUSAF.

(Right) Captain HaldaneKing, Jr during his tour inSoutheast Asia (He is notwearing the A–4 flight suitin this photograph).


(Right) Nose art on theright side of the originalB–17F Memphis Belle.This aircraft is in the midstof a complete restoration atthe National Museum of theUS Air Force.

(Below right) MemphisBelle III nose art on displayat the Museum.

NOSE ART ISA TRADITIONTHAT GOESBACKNEARLY ACENTURY…MEMPHISBELLE III…FLEW INOPERATIONDESERTSTORM

1. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary of theEnglish Language Unabridged, s.v. “heritage.”2. Ibid., s.v. “history.”3. Material culture studies originated in the 19th

Century, but experienced a revival in the 1970s whichcontinues today as a well-developed, but not well-known,academic field of study. Researchers of material culturehave many different points-of-view, and they come fromseveral backgrounds that include historians, anthropolo-gists, archaeologists, sociologists, art historians, and cura-tors.4. Thomas J. Schlereth, ed. Material Culture Studiesin America. (Nashville, Tenn.: The American Associationfor State and Local History, 1989), p. 3.5. George Kubler, The Shape of Time: Remarks on theHistory of Things (New Haven and London: YaleUniversity Press, 1962), p. 5.6. Roger G. Miller, To Save a City: The Berlin Airlft,1948-1949 (Washington, D.C.: Air Force History andMuseums Program, 1998), p. 97.7. Accession File 1976-184, NMUSAF CollectionDivision.8. Miller, To Save a City: The Berlin Airlft, 1948-1949,p. 108.9. Derek Nelson and Dave Parsons, Hell-Bent forLeather: The Saga of the A-2 and G-1 Flight Jackets(Osceola, WI, Motorbooks International Publishers &Wholesalers, 1990), pp. 11, 13, 30, 48-49.10. Accession File 1977-162-1, NMUSAF CollectionDivision.11. “Col. Stapp’s High Speed Tests Stopped” DaytonDaily News, June 17, 1956.12. Accession File 71-43-5, NMUSAF CollectionDivision; George M. Watson, Jr., Secretaries and Chiefs ofStaff of the United States Air Force (Washington, D.C.: AirForce History and Museums Program, 2001), pp. 131-33.

13. Accession File 2006-214, NMUSAF CollectionDivision.14. Samuel T. Dickens, “RF-86 Sabre Overflights inAsia,” in Early Cold War Overflights, SymposiumProceedings, Volume I: Memoirs, ed. R. Cargill Hall andClayton D. Laurie (Washington, D.C.: Office of theHistorian, National Reconnaissance Office, 2003), pp. 79-87.15. Ernest G. Schwiebert, A History of the U.S. Air ForceBallistic Missiles (New York, N.Y.: Frederick A. Praeger,Inc., 1965), pp. 122, 244-45.16. David Baker, The Rocket: The History andDevelopment of Rocket & Missile Technology (New York,NY, Crown Publishers, Inc., 1978), p. 257.17. Ernest G. Schwiebert, Air Force Ballistic Missiles,pp. 151-52.18. Susan H.H. Young, “Gallery of USAF Weapons” AirForce Magazine, May 2006, pp. 167-6919. T.R. Sturm, “Into the Valley of Death” The Airman,March 1967, pp. 4-7.20. Kenneth C. Felty, The Last Flight of Helmet #285,unpublished article, Accession File, 2005-016-001,NMUSAF Collection Division.21. Jack S. Ballard, Development and Employment ofFixed-Wing Gunships: 1962-1972 (Washington, D.C.:Office of Air Force History, 1982), pp. 240-43; Charles E.Miller, Airlift Doctrine (Maxwell AFB,Ala.:Air UniversityPress, 1988), pp. 324-25.22. Felty. The Last Flight of Helmet #285.23. C.G. Sweeting, Combat Flying Clothing: Army AirForces Clothing During World War II (Washington, D.C.:Smithsonian Institution Press, 1984), pp. 50, 51, 53, 55.24. Accession file 1973-124, NMUSAF CollectionDivision.25. Randy Walker, Painted Ladies: Modern MilitaryAircraft Nose Art & Unusual Markings


NOTES

after the war ended, the newly-created U.S. AirForce became the first service to integrate. King,Sr. passed on this A–4 to his son, Capt. HaldaneKing, Jr., who wore it while flying a KC–135 dur-ing the Southeast Asia War.24

Tellingly, the suit remained the same, but thesociety in which it was used had changed aroundit.

B–52G Nose Art

Nose art is a tradition that goes back nearly acentury, and it has a rich heritage in the Air Force.Like artwork on A–2 jackets, it is significant thatsuch overt individual expression is not onlyapproved, but is sometimes even encouraged inspite of the uniformity necessary within the mili-tary. Individual pieces of nose art also reflect thethings important to Air Force people, like patrio-tism and loved ones back home.

This piece of nose art, Memphis Belle III, waspainted on B–52G 59-2594, which flew in OPERATION

DESERT STORM in the 97th Bomb Wing.25 The art-work builds upon the legacy of the original MemphisBelle, a celebrated B–17F that was the first heavybomber in World War II to complete 25 missionsover Europe and return to the United States.Several Air Force aircraft have carried this artwork

since then, including other B–52s, an F–105Dnamed Memphis Belle II (on display in theMuseum’s Southeast Asia War Gallery), a B–1B andthe C–141C Memphis Belle IV. We can undoubtedlylook forward to future iterations of this wonderfulheritage in the years to come.

These ten artifacts from the Air Force’s historyas a separate service represent only a tiny fractionof the thousands of objects in the Air Force’snational collection. There are 68,400 at theNational Museum of the US Air Force, withanother 35,000 on loan to Air Force field museumsand other accredited institutions in the US andaround the world. The scope of these artifacts runsfrom Civil War balloon fabric to objects from cur-rent operations, and from tiny insignia pins up tothe 230-foot wingspan, 85-ton B–36J Peacemaker.Indeed, the Air Force’s heritage and history is well-preserved in objects. These tens of thousands ofobjects in the USAF’s artifact collection embodythe Air Force’s story and the inspirational storiesof the individuals who make its history. These arti-facts exist in the care of professionals to illuminatethose traditions and ideals we hold dear, and theyallow us to “touch” the past in a very direct way.

At the core, these artifacts represent the things weare. ■


A Visionary Ahead of His Time:Howard Hughes and the U.S. Air Force—Part II: The Hughes D–2 and the XF–11


Thomas Wildenberg

I n the summer of 1939, the soaring demand forAmerican airplanes—triggered by the prospectof war in Europe—enticed Howard Hughes for

another try at the military aircraft business. Onceagain, Hughes decided the time was ripe to attemptto secure a contract from the Army Air Corps. Heauthorized Stan Bell, who had taken over as chiefengineer after Dick Palmer resigned in February1938, to proceed with preliminary design work on anew plane for the Army.1 At the time, Hughes wasnegotiating with Sherman Fairchild for the exclu-sive rights to Duramold, a new aircraft construc-tion material being developed by Virginius E.Clark, a well-known aeronautical engineer whohad served as the chief aeronautical engineer forthe U.S. Army between 1915 and 1920.

Fairchild, in need of cash to expand his aircraftbusiness, offered Hughes the opportunity to pur-chase an exclusive license for the DuramoldProcess.2 The process produced a new type of mate-rial made from resin-impregnated layers of woodveneer that were molded together under pressure.Named Duramold, it appeared to be an attractivemeans of reducing the cost of aircraft manufactur-ing by eliminating the time consuming, and laborintensive riveting method of assembly that hadcome to characterize aircraft assembly. Because norivets were needed, the aerodynamic surfaces pro-duced by this process were extremely smooth. Thisfeature must have been of particular interest toHughes based on his obsession for streamlining.

The agreement was consummated on July 24,1939.3 For $170,000, the Hughes Aircraft Divisionof the Hughes Tool Company obtained exclusiverights to use the Duramold Process for the manu-facture of large aircraft defined as having oneengine of 1,000 hp or multiple engines with 1,500or more horsepower. As part of the deal, HughesAircraft obtained the services of Virginius Clark,who moved to California shortly after the agree-ment was finalized.

Motivated by unfettered ambition, zealousdetermination, and obsession for perfection,Hughes now set out to build an airplane that wouldhave such outstanding performance that the Armywould have no grounds for refusing to buy it.Driven to succeed, Hughes decided to build an air-plane designed for the military on speculation. Hehad refused to do this in the past, but was now will-ing to put his own money into the project.

As soon as the Duramold deal was consum-mated, Hughes instructed his management teamto make an all out effort to recruit engineers andshop personal. By the end of August the number ofpeople employed by the Hughes Aircraft Companyhad quadrupled. Office space was acquired on the

second floor of Hangar No. 3 at the airport inBurbank, where the company was based. Shopequipment was acquired at a fast pace and thespace leased by Hughes Aircraft was soon filledwith equipment and men working practically elbowto elbow.4

On September 16, 1939, Clark visited WrightField to find out as much as possible on the AirCorps current thinking with regard to interceptortype aircraft.5 Because of the press of new designwork, the only technical experts available to meetwith Clark were the officers and civilian engineersof the Armament and Ordnance Units. Althoughthese men were enthusiastically supportive, theywere unable to provide information on the latestdevelopments taking place due to the unclassifiednature of the Hughes project.

Nevertheless, Clark obtained information onthe latest ideas on armament, bombing, and bomb-sights, and came away from the meeting convincedof the importance of providing defense armamentin a 30-degree cone of fire directly to the rear of theaircraft. This concept appears to have led to theidea for a 2-place bomber that could function as afighter. “If a hot bomber were raising havoc in thewar,” Clark explained in a memo to Stan Bell sum-marizing his visit, “the enemy pursuit must attackit—and the bomber’s tail guns may do the trick—making the bomber a fighter … this all seems todemand that one member of the crew of two cansight to fire to the rear, either directly or by meansof a retractable periscope.”6 Clark’s thoughts onmaking the bomber a fighter influenced Hughes’ideas concerning the design concepts that were toemerge form his company’s drafting boards.

In early December, an official of Hughes Air-craft wrote the chief of the Materiel Division ex-pressing the desire to enter into a contract with thegovernment to provide performance report on theflight characteristics of a new pursuit type that thecompany was working on. 7 Although the contractwas only worth $50.00, its acceptance by the AirCorps would enable the company to buy militaryengines that would otherwise have been unavail-able. When Al Lodwick, visited Lt. Gen. George H.Brett a few days later in Washington, D. C., one ofthe items discussed was the approval to purchase“government furnished equipment,” from commer-cial firms. 8 Lodwick, acting on behalf of the HughesAircraft Company, met with the assistant chief ofthe Air Corps to discuss the terms of the contract.General Brett’s boss, General Henry H. “Hap”Arnold had previously approved the project havinginformed Hughes at the end of October that the AirCorps would cooperate insofar as possible.9 AsArnold later recalled:


Thomas Wildenberg is the co-author of Howard Hughes: An Airman, His Aircraft and His GreatFlights (Paladwr Press, 2006). He is a former Smithsonian Fellow having served successive termsas a Ramsey Fellow at the National Air and Space Museum in 1998 and 1999. Mr. Wildenberg isthe recipient of a number of awards recognizing his scholarship. These include the Surface NavyAssociation Literary Award, the Edward S. Miller History Award, and the John Laymen Award.The first part of this article was published in the Fall 2007 issue of Air Power History.

Howard Hughes at controlsof the XF–11 minutesbefore takeoff in the near-fatal crash of July 7, 1946.(Photo courtesy of theFlorida Air Museum.)

FAIRCHILD,IN NEED OFCASH TOEXPAND HISAIRCRAFTBUSINESS,OFFEREDHUGHES THEOPPOR-TUNITY TOPURCHASEAN EXCLUSIVELICENSE FORTHEDURAMOLDPROCESS

The [Hughes] design was highly interesting as adevelopment type since duramold construction wasto be used and it presented the premise of improve-ment in the aerodynamic and structural arts. Thehigh speed of the proposed airplane made it supe-rior to any other design under consideration at thetime. At this time there was a great shortage of alu-minum. We hoped to find a substitute. This lookedlike a very promising substitute and had the short-age of aluminum materialized, this might havemade it possible for us to have secured quantity pro-duction in spite of any shortage.10

Before the year was out Clark, assisted by CarlBabberger, Hughes’ chief aerodynamicist, beganconducting tests at 8-foot, high-speed, wind tunnellocated at the Langley Research Center operatedby the National Advisory Committee for Aero-nautics (NACA). According to the official history,this was the only privately-funded testing everdone in Langley’s 8-foot tunnel. The most remark-able aspect of this Hughes program, however, wasthe fact that the test models were not actually rep-resentations of the configuration Hughes wasdesigning. To preserve company secrecy, the testmodels had been designed to answer questions rel-ative to nacelle placement, etc., without revealingthe real configuration to NACA engineers.11

Meanwhile, the paper work authorizing theMateriel Division to enter into a contract with theHughes Aircraft Company slowly worked its waythrough the bureaucracy. By the time it was for-mally issued at the end of May 1940, the HughesDX–2, as it was now being referred to, was a long-range, medium bomber with a five-man crew, aspeed in excess of 300 mph, and a gross weight of37,000 pounds.12 From the evidence that follows, itis clear that the bomber was only one of severaldesign concepts Hughes’s engineers were workingon; for when Air Corps personal visited HughesAircraft in March 1941, the bomber design hadmorphed into a 2-place, 2,600-mile range, 450 mphfighter armed with seven 50-cal. machine guns andpowered by two Curtiss-Wright Tornado engines.13

As work progressed in the hangar at Burbank,it soon became apparent that a considerableamount of additional space would be needed to fab-ricate the parts and assemblies for the new air-

plane. At this point Hughes gave the go ahead tobuild a new plant. Rather than locate the new plantadjacent to the airport in Burbank, Hughes askedGlenn Odekirk to look for a new site that hadenough land for an airstrip. Odekirk found an ideallocation in Culver City that had enough room forthe 9,500-foot airstrip Hughes wanted.14 Arrange-ments were quickly made to buy 380 acres of landand plans formulated to construct four buildingswith a total floor area of 226,000 sq. ft. Con-struction started in the spring of 1941 and the firstbuilding was completed by the end of June. All theoperations of Hughes Aircraft, until then located inBurbank, were moved to the new building inCulver City on the Fourth of July weekend.

On October 1, 1941, unidentified representa-tives of the Hughes Company called on the Chief ofthe Materiel Division, Brig. Gen. Oliver P. Echols,at his office in Washington, D.C., to solicit a supportfor the Hughes D–2. Echols wisely declined tomake any commitment to purchase the new planeciting a lack of knowledge about the airplane due tothe secrecy surrounding the project and the limitednumber of people who had been allowed to inspecttheir work. 15 After meeting with the representa-tives from Hughes, Echols wired Brig. Gen. GeorgeC. Kenney, the assistant chief of the MaterielDivision located at Wright Field requesting infor-mation on the airplane and its possible procure-ment.

General Kenney responded two days later witha four-page letter summarizing what was knownabout the DX–2 and its status within the MaterielDivision.16 Attached to General Kenney’s letter wasan unfavorable report prepared by the AircraftLaboratory at Wright Field stating that the air-plane’s design did not meet the Army Air Forcesspecifications for pursuit load factors and was notequipped with armor plate or self-sealing fueltanks. The laboratory’s engineers were also againstthe use of Duramold, which they considered animproper material for the primary structure ofhigh performance tactical aircraft.

The chief of the Experimental EngineeringSection, Lt. Col. Franklin O. Carroll, undertook thedistasteful task of notifying Hughes Aircraft of theAir Forces’ decision. On November 7, 1941, heinformed the company by letter that the DX–2could not be made into a satisfactory military air-plane and the best interests of the Governmentwould not be served by its procurement.17 As a con-ciliatory gesture, Colonel Carroll suggested thatthe company consider redesigning the plane as anescort to protect bombers in accordance to detailedset of the military characteristics laid out inanother section of his letter.

The importance Hughes placed on the projectis indicated by the zeal with which his companyresponded. Within a week, Stan Bell and Ken Riley,two Hughes Aircraft engineers, were back atWright Field to discuss the design changes man-dated by the Army. They agreed to make a study ofan airplane constructed out of Duramold thatwould meet the military characteristics for escort-


One of the wind tunnelmodels used to design theD–2 that was found in theHoward Hughes Collection,Florida Air Museum. (Photocourtesy of the author.)

THE MOSTREMARK-ABLEASPECT OFTHIS HUGHESPROGRAM,HOWEVER,WAS THEFACT THATTHE TESTMODELSWERE NOTACTUALLYREPRESEN-TATIONS OFTHE CONFIG-URATIONHUGHES WASDESIGNING

ing bombers up to a range of 2,000 miles. It wouldhave a pressurized cabin, a laminar flow wing, andbe armed with two 4-gun turrets.18 When Lt. Col.M. S. Roth, chief of the Research and DevelopmentSection, visited Hughes Aircraft in early January1942, the company’s 500 employees with its 75engineers were all working on the DX–2. Stan Belland his designers were also in the process ofpreparing specifications for another new design,which Roth described as a “Duramold duplicate” ofthe Lockheed XP–58.19

Neither Colonel Roth nor boss, Frank Carroll,now a full colonel, was impressed with the Hughesoperation. “It is the opinion of this office,” Carrollwrote in an internal memorandum highly criticalHughes and his operation, “that this plant is ahobby of the management and that the present pro-ject now being engineered is a waste of time andthat the facilities, both in engineering personneland equipment, are not being used to the fulladvantage in this emergency.”20

From the foregoing, it is evident that the engi-neers at Wright Field were not enamored withHughes Aircraft or its Duramold airplane. Hugheshad “friends in high places,” however, and was notopposed to using his money or influence inWashington. There is no evidence to suggest thatHughes used his influence directly with GeneralEchols, who was involved with both the XP–2 andthe twin engine pursuit projects noted in Part I (ofthis series), but it is interesting to note that thedecision not to procure the DX–2 was reversed dur-ing a conference at Wright Field that Echolsattended. Echols along with Gen. Arthur W.Vanaman and members of the ExperimentalEngineering Section concluded that the DX–2 held“sufficient promise of improvement in the aerody-namic and structural arts to warrant its procure-ment by the Air Forces.”21 Echols recommendationwas forwarded to General Arnold via Echols’ chiefof staff, Brig. Gen. Bennett “Benny” E. Meyers,whose covering memo provides additional insightsinto the reasons for the Air Forces’ change ofmind.22 “This airplane,” Meyers wrote, “offers thefirst really good opportunity to find out just whatcan be done in the medium airplane field whencombining nearly one-hundred percent woodenconstruction with high output power plants.”23

Arnold, against his better judgement and theadvice of his staff, quickly approved the project.

While the contract was being formalized,Howard Hughes took steps to make sure that therewould be no foul ups along the way. In mid June, hesent an emissary to Secretary of Commerce JesseH. Jones with instructions to extol the virtues ofthe D–2 so that Jones might put in a good word forthe project with President Roosevelt.24 Jones, afriend of the Hughes family and fellow Texan,wielded so much power and influence in Wash-ington that the press had dubbed him “EmpireJones.” On June 17, 1942, Jones spoke with thePresident privately at the White House. What wassaid is not known, but Jones left the president atwo-paragraph statement about Hughes and thedesign for his new airplane. The President for-warded it to Arnold. Scrawled across the top wasFDR’s hand-written note: “What is there in this?”25

General Arnold answered the next day stating thatthe air force has been in close touch with HowardHughes and was negotiating to see if they couldarrive at a price agreeable to both parties.26

The problem that Hughes now faced was howto recoup his investment. He had poured over$3,000,000 into the D–2, but the Army was onlywilling to purchase it for $500,000.27 Hughesdecided to wait until after the plane’s first flight inthe hope that its performance would be so spectac-ular that the Army would offer a production con-tract that would enable him to recover his originalinvestment.

No further action was taken by the Army AirForces until June of the following year. By then,combat experience in the African and Europeantheaters had indicated the need for a long-range,high altitude photoreconnaissance plane. On June27, 1943 General Arnold unexpectedly re-endorsedthe D–2 project when it became apparent that “we[the Army Air Forces] could not get all theMosquitoes that we needed for our night fightersand reconnaissance needs.”28 By then Hughes hadmade the first flight in the D–2. The airplane’sflight characteristics proved disappointing. Thelaminar flow airfoil chosen for the wing had neverbeen used before. It created instability problemswith the ailerons that were never completelysolved, even though the Hughes team tried every-thing they could do to correct the problem.29

The design problems with the D–2’s wing didnot stop Hughes’s quest for an air force contract. Asan alternative he proposed to design and build theD–5A. It would have the same tail boom, samelanding gear, same fuselage, and the same enginemounts as the D–2, but would have an entirely newwing based on the NACA Series 66 airfoil.30

Specifications for the new plane were listed as fol-lows:

Gross Weight 36,400 lbs.Take Off Distance 2,570 ft.Take Off Over 50 ft. Obstacle 3,040 ft.Rate of Climb at Sea Level 2,040 ft. per min.Rate of Climb at 25,000 ft. 1,585 ft. per min.Service Ceiling 37,000 ft.Top Speed @ 30,000 ft. 488 mph


The D–2 photographed atHarper Lake. One of onlytwo photos of the aircraftknown to exist. (Photocourtesy of the Florida AirMuseum.)

HUGHES HAD“FRIENDS INHIGHPLACES,”HOWEVER,AND WASNOTOPPOSED TOUSING HISMONEY ORINFLUENCEINWASHINGTON

Hughes proposal failed to sway the engineersat Wright Field who had been against the D–2 fromthe start. They were not impressed by the D–5’sperformance, which appeared to be overly opti-mistic in comparison to Lockheed’s XP–58, whichwas much further along and proffered by the engi-neers at Wright Field.31 They continued to lobbyagainst the use of Duramold and recommendedagainst its further development.32 Their recom-mendations were approved by the chief of the AirStaff, Maj. Gen. George E. Stratemeyer. On August21, 1943, he directed—with General Arnold’s con-currence—that no further action be taken encour-aging the development of or diversion of facilities tothe DX–2 project or its outgrowth, the D–5.33 Itlooked as if the engineers at Wright Field hadfinally killed the D–2 project, but Howard Hugheshad a knack for pulling a rabbit out of a hat. He hadan innate talent for finding just the “right” contactsand adroitly exploiting them to achieve his ends. Inthe case of the D–2, that contact proved to be thePresident’s second son, Col. Elliot Roosevelt.

That summer, Colonel Roosevelt, who had for-mally commanded a reconnaissance unit inEurope, had been assigned chairman of a commit-tee of experienced photo-reconnaissance officers tosurvey aircraft plants in order to recommend thebest source to fill the photo-reconnaissance needs of

the Army Air Forces. When the Roosevelt missionreached Los Angeles on August 8, 1943, Hughesassigned his favorite public relations man, John W.Meyer, to take the President’s son under his wing.34

Roosevelt and his entourage where wined anddinned by Meyer, who escorted them on guidedtours of the Hollywood studios. At WarnerBrothers, Meyer introduced Elliot to actress FayeEmerson, leading to a romance that culminated intheir marriage four months later.

Hughes personally led Roosevelt and his fellowofficers on a tour of the Hughes Aircraft plant inCulver City before flying them to Harper Lake, adry lakebed a hundred miles north of Los Angles,where Hughes was secretly testing the D–2.Although the D–2 was partially disassembled in itsair-conditioned hangar, the entire party enthusias-tically clustered around the plane admiring itssmooth lines. Commander D. W. Stevenson, amuch-decorated Royal Air Force pilot who wasaccompanying Roosevelt, told Hughes, “I havenever seen anything more magnificent that coulddo a better job.”35

On August 31 Colonel Roosevelt informedGeneral Arnold that the DX–5 was the only air-plane already designed that was suitable for photo-graphic purposes. General Arnold immediatelyissued verbal orders directing that steps be takento get Hughes a contract.36 As he later explained,“It was the Hughes plane or nothing.”37

Frank Carroll, now a brigadier general, contin-ued to raise objections to the Hughes airplanepointing out that there were no engineering rea-sons for its procurement. “The Air ServiceCommand,” he wrote in a memorandum addressedto the Commanding General, Materiel Command,“have gone on record as stating they do not desireto have any more wooden aircraft due to the main-tenance difficulties involved. In addition, theLockheed XP–58 has been engineered for produc-tion, whereas the Hughes airplane has to be mate-rially redesigned for production.”38 Despite theseconcerns, an Authority for Purchase was issued onOctober 6, 1943, covering a cost-plus, fixed fee con-tract for the procurement of 100 D–5 aircraft plusspare parts. Total estimated cost, including spareparts was estimated at $56,581, 200.

When the detailed set of specification for theD–5 was received by the Materiel Command eightdays later, it continued a totally unsatisfactory pro-vision for the power plant/propeller combination.The company had selected a reduction gear andcontra-rotating propeller that did not exist for theR-2800 that they had planned to use. The MaterielCommand then proposed three alternate engines,which could be made available in time to meet theproposed initial delivery date in November 1944.Hughes design team selected the Pratt & WhitneyR-4360 with a .331 reduction gear, together with fif-teen-foot Hamilton Standard, eight bladed superhydromatic contra-rotating propellers.39

The Engineering Division at Wright Field onceagain raised the issue of using wood (Duramold) inthe aircraft’s structure. On January 5, 1944,


General arrangement draw-ing of the D–5. Note thesimilarity to the NorthropP–61. (Photo courtesy ofthe author.)

HUGHES HADA KNACKFOR PULLINGA RABBITOUT OF AHAT

Colonel P. H. Kemmer, chief of the AircraftLaboratory, sent an inter-office memorandum tothe Chief of the Production Engineering Section,recommending “that steps be taken to eliminatedthe use of wood or plywood from all portions of theflight structure.”40 Hughes was having a runningbattle with Grover Loening at the time over the useof Duramold in the troubled HK-1 design that heand Henry Kaiser were furiously trying to keepalive. Hughes still strongly favored wood, accordingto the comments that he made in front of the WarProduction Board on October 21, 1943, but hewisely heeded Colonel Kemmer’s advise when toldabout the Air Forces’ strenuous objection to the useof wood.41 Within a few days of their conversation,Howard Hughes called Wright Field to advise theProduction Engineering Section that the airplanewould be constructed entirely of metal.

Although Hughes Aircraft had received a letterof intent to build one hundred D–5 (AAF ModelF–11) airplanes in mid October, a formal contracthad yet to be agreed upon. In mid- January 1944,two representatives of Hughes Aircraft were sentto Wright Field to discuss the terms of the contract,which would include provisions for Hughes torecover the $3,650,000 dollars that he had investedin the D–2.42 Hughes claimed that the $3,650,000represented development work on the F–11 andasked to be reimbursed for that amount. Includedin this amount were costs incurred for: studies onalternate engine installations; the Allison engineproject that was abandoned in 1940; developmentcost and license for the Duramold process; depreci-ation and insurance on his Boeing Stratoliner dur-ing 1940; and research and work done on the cabinpressurization of the Stratoliner would be used on

the F–11.Neither the Production Division nor the

Materiel Division approved of this arrangement.General Carroll, still chief of the engineering divi-sion, believed that Hughes’ contention that the D–2was a prototype for the F–11 was “ridiculous.”

We might just as well say the B-17 is a prototype ofthe B-29 or that the BT-8 is a prototype of the P-47. In addition to not being a prototype, the D 2 is

not an experimental version of the F 11 Airplane.Aside from the general geometric shape and a fewdetails, such as the throttle handle, mixture control,flap controls, etc., they are two separate and distinctflying machines.The contention that the flying char-acteristics will be identical or even a similar is toofare fetched for further comment. The F 11 is not ascaled up version of the D 2 in that the weights aredifferent, the airfoil section is different, the percent-age of control area is different, and many other dif-ferences exist too numerous to mention.43

When the dispute over the D–2 developmentcosts was not resolved to his satisfaction, Hugheslet it be known that his firm could not lose$3,500,000 and continue with the F–11 project. OnMarch 21, 1944, General Meyers discussed theongoing contract problems with General Echols.44

After discussing the matter, General Echolsdirected the supervisor of the Western Air CorpsProcurement District, Brigadier GeneralBranshaw, to comply with the basic memorandumof October 16, 1943, as approved by General Arnoldstating “that the development costs of the D–2 air-plane be included in the contract with Hughes.”General Branshaw met with Hughes the next day


The first Constellationparked in front of one ofthe Lockheed hangars.

GENERALCARROLL,STILL CHIEFOF THE ENGI-NEERINGDIVISION,BELIEVEDTHATHUGHES’CONTENTIONTHAT THED–2 WAS APROTOTYPEFOR THEF–11 WAS“RIDICU-LOUS”

and advised him tht a separate item would beincluded in the contract for previous developmentcosts.45 While the details were being worked out,Hughes took time from his busy schedule to setanother transcontinental flight record.

During his second record-setting transconti-nental flight in the H–1 Racer on January 20, 1937,Hughes had experienced a lot of trouble with hisoxygen system at high altitude. He had flown forseveral hours on the verge of unconsciousness. Theexperience gave him an idea. He dreamed of an air-plane that would permit passengers to fly at thesame high speed and at the same altitude, but witha difference: the flight would be in perfect comfort.He kept thinking about what could be done if anairline put enough effort into such an ambitiousproject.

Hughes got the chance to go act on this visionafter he acquiring a controlling interest in theTranscontinental and Western Airline (T.W.A.) inthe early part of 1939. In April 1939, Hughes,decided to develop a new high speed, super-deluxe,four-engined airliner with transcontinental rangefor the airline.46 It would have a pressurized cabin,fly at 20,000 feet, and be able to carry 57 passen-gers and 6,000 pounds of cargo nonstop across thecountry. The new airliner would be T.W.A.’s secret

weapon against all other competing airlines. Theairplane, which was later named the Constellation,was developed in great secrecy by the LockheedAircraft Corporation under the Model 049 designa-tion.

When the production of commercial airlinerswas suspended at the outbreak of World War II, theConstellation program was turned over to theArmy Air Forces for series production as the C-69transport. During the negotiations with the Army,Hughes astutely worked out an ingenious agree-ment that gave T.W.A. jurisdiction over the first air-plane off the production line so that the airlinecould conduct shakedown flight for the airlinebefore turning it over to the Army.47 The deal gaveHughes the opportunity to orchestrate a great pub-licity event for T.W.A., while setting yet anothertranscontinental flight record.

At 3:56 a.m. on April 17, 1944, Howard Hughesand Jack Frye, T.W.A.’s president, took off fromBurbank and headed for Washington, D.C. Fryewas in command, with Hughes as the copilot. Atexactly the halfway point they changed places sothat Hughes would have the honor of landing theairplane in Washington when they touched down.48

They set a new transcontinental speed record for acommercial transport of 6 hours 58 minutes. To thechagrin of the Army brass, the airplane wasdressed in the airline’s distinctive color scheme,bearing the T.W.A. logo on its nose, and the airline’sslogan, “The Transcontinental Airline” prominentlydisplayed in the center of the fuselage.

The New York Times hailed the flight as an“outline of the shape of things to come.” 49 GeneralArnold was furious at the publicity garnered for theairline. He was not pleased either, when Hughesspent several more days demonstrating the Con-stellation to high government officials—includingthe entire Civil Aeronautics Board—instead oftransferring the C–69 immediately to the AirForces, as stipulated in the contract.

Three weeks after the flight, on May 5, a con-tract was finally signed between the United Statesgovernment and the Hughes Tool Company for theproduction of a high speed reconnaissance air-plane. The fixed-fee contract provided for the pro-curement of two XF–11s, one static test model, andninety-eight production airplanes.50 Although thepurchase of the D–2 was not explicitly authorized,a sum in excess of three million dollars was allowedfor D–2 development under the condition that acommittee would be appointed to determine theamount applicable to the F–11. In November, theboard convened for this purpose approved 57.5 per-cent of this amount permitting Hughes to recover$1,906,826.13—the money he had invested in theD–2.51

By the time the contract was signed, the deliv-ery schedule for the first F–11 had already beenpushed back. The delay had been caused by indeci-sion on a number of major design componentsincluding the wing, powerplant, nacelles, and land-ing gear. The biggest impediment to the project,according to Lt. Col. E. W. Dickman, was Howard


Howard Hughes with Gen.Henry H. “Hap” Arnold exit-ing the Constellation whileit was being shown off inWashington.

GENERALARNOLD WASFURIOUS ATTHE PUBLICITYGARNEREDFOR THE AIRLINE

Hughes.

The main trouble seems to be that Mr. Hughes per-sonally with the best of intentions, insists uponmaking numerous detailed technical decisions,which normally would be left to competent subordi-nates. Mr. Hughes has many other interests that heis not in a position to direct his full attention to theF 11 project and as a consequence, the developmentis proceeding much more slowly than if things werehandled in a business like manner.52

In addition to his the troubles with the F–11,Hughes was fighting to save the HK–1, which wasin even worse shape from a production-engineeringstandpoint. In an attempt to rectify the company’seproblems, Hughes reorganized Hughes Aircraftunder the leadership of Charles W. Perelle, whowas hired to take over the ailing company. Perelle,who had been vice-president in charge of produc-tion of the Consolidated-Vultee Aircraft Company,was known as the “boy wonder” of aircraft produc-tion.

When Perelle took over, some of the completedengineering drawings were so poor they had to bethrown out. Relations with Wright Field were theworst that he had encountered in his fifteen yearsof production experience. According to his later tes-timony, the problems with the F–11 stemmedmostly from “a complete lack of experience in thedesign and construction of airplanes in general.”53

Despite Perelle’s management skills, the problemscontinued; lack of engines, engineering differenceswith the Army, labor troubles, and difficulties withsubcontractors, all took their toll.

By February 1945, serious questions arosewithin the Materiel Command as to the advisabil-ity of continuing the production contract. A Bureauof Budgets report indicated that the cost of theHughes airplane was excessive in comparison withothers of similar size and usefulness. There wasalso growing doubt that the F–11 would be pro-duced in time to be of value to the war. On May 26,1945, the order for 98 production airplanes wascancelled. Only the two experimental versionswould be completed.

Hughes Aircraft continued to encounter a vari-

ety of problems that delayed delivery of the firstXF–11 until the spring of 1946. Although the firsttaxi tests were conducted in mid-April, it took sev-eral more months to work out all of the bugs beforethe aircraft was ready for flight. The Army hadintended to conduct a flight test program from theair base at Muroc, California, but it was cancelledwhen Hughes decided to conduct the flights himselffrom the field at Culver City.54

Hughes decided to make the first test flight onSunday, July 7, 1946. He arrived at the Culver Cityairport that morning and spent a good part of theday making taxi runs, checking the airplane, anddiscussing the flight plan with the company’sflight-test engineer. Late in the day, as the groundcrew prepared the airplane for flight, Hughesinstructed them to load the XF–11 with 1,200 gal-lons of high-octane gasoline—double the amountspecified in the approved flight plan. He obviouslyexpected to fly the ship longer than the forty-fiveminute time originally allotted in the approvedflight plan. It was after 5 o’clock when Hughesclimbed into the cockpit, warmed up the enginesand taxied to the end of the airstrip. At precisely5:20 p.m., he pushed the throttles of the XF–11 for-ward and roared down the runway, eased back onthe control stick, and was airborne. As the runwaydropped away, Hughes retracted the landing gear.This was another deviation from that flight plan, asit was standard procedure to leave the gear downduring the first flight. As he climbed away from thefield the landing gear warning light stayed redindicating that the gear was not locked. It wouldn’tgo out until he pushed sharply on the controlstick.55

An hour and fifteen minutes into the flight—well beyond the forty-five minutes allocated—theXF–11 abruptly pitched to the right. To Hughes it“suddenly felt as if someone had tied a barn doorbroadside onto the right-hand wing.” 56 Hughesexplained what happened next:

I unfastened my seat belt, got up, and looked quicklyout all the windows of the cabin. I wanted to see ifany large part of the airplane, such as a section ofthe wing, tail, or landing gear door, might possiblyhave been torn loose and swung by the wind into abroadside position.

With this last though in mind, I lowered and raisedthe landing gear, hoping to break completely loosefrom the airplane any landing gear door whichmight have jammed into a broadside position.

I could not see anything which was holding theplane back, yet it felt as if some giant had the rightwing of the airplane in his hand and was pushingit back down.57

Hughes returned to his seat and increased thepower on both engines, cut both back, and thenincreased the power only on the right engine. No-thing worked. The XF–11 was losing altitude sofast that Hughes was forced to make an emergency


The D–2 in front of its air-conditioned hangar aHarper Lake. The aircraftwas destroyed one daywhen the wooden hangarmysteriously caught fireand burned to the ground.(Photo courtesy of theFlorida Air Museum.)

IT FELT AS IFSOME GIANTHAD THERIGHT WINGOF THE AIR-PLANE IN HISHAND ANDWAS PUSH-ING IT BACKDOWN

landing on the only open space he could see, the golfcourse belonging to the Los Angeles Country Club.He never made it.

The XF–11 struck the roof of a home at 803North Linden Drive, in Beverly Hills. The aircraftsliced into the house next door, sheared off a utilitypole, before coming to rest in an alley. Hughescrawled out of the cockpit and collapsed onto theburning wing before he was pulled to safety by anearby bystander. He was lucky to be alive.

The crash nearly killed the 41-year-old testpilot. It crushed his chest, fracturing nine of theribs on his left side and two on his right; displacedhis heart to one side of his chest cavity; puncturedhis lung in six places causing it to collapse; andseverely burned his right hand. Less criticalinjuries sustained by Hughes included seconddegree burns over his chest and buttocks, and abroken nose. He also suffered numerous cuts,bruises and abrasions over his entire body.

While Hughes was recovering in the hospital,he received a telegram from General Carl Spaatz,the commanding general of the Army Air Forcesexpressing his concern and wishing him a speedyrecovery.58 On the morning of August 1, 1946, in anunusual show of support, planes form the TwelfthAir Force while on a mass flight commemoratingthe 39th anniversary of the U.S. Army Air Arm, cir-cled Good Samaritan Hospital.

As for the crash, an air force investigatingboard concluded that the right rear propeller hadlost oil, reversed pitch, and created a drag on theright side of the airplane. But in a devastating blowto Hughes’ ego, the board concluded that the acci-dent was avoidable and attributed the crash to

pilot error. It criticized Hughes for not using thespecial radio frequency that had been set aside forthe test flight, for not being fully acquainted withthe emergency operating procedures for the pro-pellers, for retracting the landing gear in violationof the approved plan, and for falling to consider anemergency landing.

Hughes felt that he had been “unduly discrim-inated” by the investigating board’s report.59 Thiswas only to be expected from a man of his reputa-tion and personality who would not admit that hehad made a mistake. In order to redeem himself “inthe eyes of the Army and public at large” he wantedto fly the second XF–11 when it was ready forflight. Much to Hughes chagrin, Wright Field askedHughes Aircraft to furnish the name of a test pilotother than Howard Hughes.60

Hughes decided to appeal his case personallyto top command. He flew to Washington, D.C.,where he called on Lt. Gen. Ira C. Eaker, deputycommanding general of the Army Air Forces, at hisresidence in Fort Meyer, Virginia. Hughes tried toconvince Eaker that it would be “much safer” forhim to fly the XF–11 than another pilot since hewas already familiar with the airplane.61 When thisdidn’t work, Hughes promised to “pay the govern-ment $5 million if the plane crashed with him atthe controls.”62 That decision was up to his boss,explained Eaker, who immediately phoned GeneralSpaatz, who lived nearby, to ask him if he coulddrop over to discuss the matter. Spaatz had noobjections to Hughes flying the XF–11 under thoseconditions and told both men that he wold issue thenecessary orders.63

On April 5, 1947, nine months after his near-


Hughes taxies the XF–11 atthe Culver City airstrip ashe prepares for the firsttest flight on Sunday, July7, 1946. (Photo courtesy ofthe Florida Air Museum.)

IN A DEVAS-TATINGBLOW TOHUGHES’EGO, THEBOARD CON-CLUDEDTHAT THEACCIDENTWAS AVOID-ABLE ANDATTRIBUTEDTHE CRASHTO PILOTERROR

Note on Sources: Much of the previously published infor-mation concerning the events associated with the D-2and FX-11 were culled from the transcripts of the SenateWar Hearings conducted in 1947. Many of the state-ments made during these hearings appear at odds withthe information contained in the records of the officialcase history.

1. Untitled, unpaginated manuscript prepared a for-mer employee of Hughes Aircraft, name unknown,Project III Binder, [hereafter D-2 Project Book] HowardHughes Collection, Florida Air Museum, Lakeland,Florida.2. Sherman Fairchild to Howard Hughes, Jul 18, 1939,

Sherman F. Fairchild Papers; “Howard Hughes ObtainsLicense for Plastic Process for Large Planes,” news clip-ping date stamped Dec1, 1939, Hughes Clipping File,American Institute of Aeronautics Collection, LC.3. Agreement dated the [24] day of July, 1939, betweenJohn F. Neary, Jr., as Trustee, Hughes Tool Company, aDelaware corporation, Haskelite Manufacturing Corpo-ration, a New York Corporation, and Clark Aircraft Cor-poration, A Delaware Corporation, unsigned copy oflicense agreement, D-2 Project Book.4. Untitled manuscript, D-2 Project Book.5. Virginius Clark, Memorandum for Mr. Bell datedSep 16, 1939, D-2 Project Book.6. Ibid., p. 3-4.


fatal crash, Hughes climbed into the second XF–11and prepared the aircraft for takeoff. Noticeablyabsent from the aircraft were the counter-rotatingpropeller blades that had caused the accident thathad nearly taken his life. In their place were stan-dard four-blade propellers. The dramatic take-offwas staged in front of some 500 Hughes Aircraftemployees who had come out to watch their boss.Hughes spent ninety minutes in the air overCulver City before landing. He emerged from thecockpit smiling and was greeted by a round ofapplause from the spectators.

Before the AAF would accept delivery of theXF–11, a number of test flights had to be flown inorder to satisfy the terms of the government’s con-tract. Most of these were conducted by Hugheshimself. These continued until November when ifwas formally accepted.The AAF then conducted its

own flight test program, for although Hughes wasvery good at providing information on how the air-plane felt and handled, but he was too much of anindividualist and too undisciplined to provide thekind of data needed for quantitative analysis of theaircraft’s performance characteristics.

The XF–11 was one of the last high-poweredpiston engined aircraft produced for the Air Force.Its performance was impressive, but it was obsoleteby the time it flew having been eclipsed by the newjets and was soon scrapped. For Hughes, the XF–11was a commercial failure that could have markedthe end of his aircraft company, but like the mythi-cal Phoenix that rose up from the ashes, HughesAircraft was destined to achieve success. ThroughHoward Hughes’ vision, it would became the AirForce’s primary supplier of airborne radar, fire con-trol systems, and air-to-air guided missiles. ■

NOTES

The second XF–11 beingprepared for flight. (Photocourtesy of the Florida AirMuseum.)

FORHUGHES, THEXF–11 WAS ACOMMERCIALFAILURETHAT COULDHAVEMARKED THEEND OF HISAIRCRAFTCOMPANY

7. Letter addressed to Chief of the Material Divisionfrom a vice president of Hughes Aircraft [signature illeg-ible] dated December 5, 1939, microfilm frame 101, “CaseHistory of Hughes D-2, D-5, F-11 Project” [hereafter AirForce Case History], microfilm frame 101, Historian’sOffice,Air Force Material Command,Wright Paterson AirForce Base, Ohio.8. Material Division to Hughes Aircraft, Dec 11, 1939,Air Force Case History, microfilm frame 103.9. Technical Instruction TI-27, dated Oct 30, 1939, ascited by Genl George C. Kinney to Chief of the MaterialDivision, Oct 31, 1941, Air Force Case History, microfilmframe 127.10. H. H. Arnold to Westbook Peglear, March 1, 1946, D-2, D-5, F-11 Project Book, Vol. II, NM-6, Entry 22, RecordGroup 18, National Archives, College Park, Md.11. John V. Becker, The High Speed Frontier, NASA SP-445, www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/SP-445/ ch2-3.htm.12. General George C. Kinney to Chief of the MaterialDivision, Octr 31, 1941, Air Force Case History, microfilmframe 127.13. Memo Report No. INSP-M-23-E(1)-41, Mar 24, 1941,Air Force Case File, microfilm frame 108. Note: there isno evidence in the official record that General Arnoldattempted to visit the Hughes Aircraft plant and wasturned away as Hughes stated in testimony given in 1947during the Senate Hearings on World War II defensespending abuses.14. Charles Barton, Howard Hughes and His FlyingBoat (Blue Ridge Summit, Pa.: Tab Aero, 1982), p. 35015. O. P. Echols to Assistant Chief of Material, Oct 1,1941, Air Force Case File, microfilm frame 1188.16. George C. Kenney, Asstant Chief of the MaterialDivision to Chief of the Material Division, Oct 3, 1941,AirForce Case File, microform pages 1192-96.17. F. O. Carroll to Hughes Aircraft Company, Nov 7,1941, Air Force Case File, microform pages 1198-99.18. Air Corps Material Division, Memorandum Reportof Duramold Airplane by Hughes Aircraft Corporation,Nov 14, 1941, F-11 File, Records of the Army Air ForcesNational Archives, College Park, Md. (hereafter F-11File).19. F. O. Carroll to Assistant Chief, Material Division,Jan 28, 1942, F-11 File.20. Ibid.21. O. P. Echols to Gen.H. H. Arnold, May 27, 1942, F-11File.22. Note: this took place before Meyers, who was laterstripped of his decoration and pension for illegal dealings,became close friends with Howard Hughes.23. B. E. Meyers memorandum for Lt. General Arnold(no date), F-11 File.24. Donald L. Bartlett and James B. Steele, Empire: TheLife Legend and Madness of Howard Hughes (New York:W. W. Norton, 1979) pp. 109-10.25. F. D. R., Memorandum for General Arnold, Jul 7,1942, F-11 File.26. H. H. Arnold, Memorandum for the President, Jul 8,1942, F-11 File.27. Transcript of telephone conversation between MajorGeneral Echols and Col. F. O. Carroll, July 29, 1942, F-11File.28. General Stratemeyer to Asst. Chief of the Air Staff,June 17, 1943, F-11 File.29. Transcript of telephone conversation between ColM.S. Roth and Mr. Howard Hughes, 1 July 1943, F-11 File;Barton, Howard Hughes and His Flying Boat, p. 130.30. Transcript of telephone conversation between CollM. S. Roth and Mr. Howard Hughes, 1 July 1943,telegram Howard Hughes to Colonel M. S. Roth, July 2,1942, F-11 File.31. Major C. B. Seftenberg to Assistant Chief of the AirStaff for Material, Maintenance and Distribution[General Echols], Hughes DX-2 Airplane, Jul 3, 1943, F-

11 File.32. Gen Echols to Chief of the Air Staff, August 13, 1943,F-11 File.33. Gen.l B. W. Childaw to Commanding General,Material Command, Wright Field, Aug 21, 1943, F-11 File.34. Donald L. Bartlett and James B. Steele, Empire: TheLife, Legend, and Madness of Howard Hughes (New York:W.W. Norton, 1979), p. 125.35. U.S. Senate, Congressional Session 80-1, Inves-tigation of the National Defense Program, Part 40: Air-craft Contracts (Hughes Aircraft Co. and Kaiser HughesCorp.) page 23968.36. Echols to Chidlaw, Memo dated Aug 31, 1943, SaraClarke Collecion.37. Henry H. Arnold, Global Mission (New York: Harper& Brothers, 1949), p. 378.38. Gen. Carroll to Commanding General, MaterialCommand, memorandum dated Sep 17, 1943, F-11 File.39. Chief of the Air Staff to Assistant Chief of Air StaffMMD, telex dated Nov26, 1943, Air Force Case File,microfilm frame 1283-85.40. Colonel Kemmer to Chief of Production EngineeringSection, memorandum dated January 5, 1944, Air ForceCase File, microfilm frame 1295.41. Barton, Howard Hughes and His Flying Boat, pp.90-91; telephone conversation between Howard Hughesand Captain D. E. Riley, Jan 12, 1944, Air Force Case File,microfilm frame 233.42. Col. D.C. Swatland to Chief Production Division,Wright Field, Jan 20, 1944, microfilm frame 1302.43. Gen. Carroll to Lt. Col. E. W. Dickman, Mar 14 1944,microfilm frame 1342.44. Memorandum for Board, Material Division, AC/AS,MM&D, Mar 22, 1944, Air Force Case File, microfilmframe 1351.45. Memorandum for File with hand written notation onmeeting, March 13, 1944, Air Force Case File, microfilmframe 1354.46. Robert W. Rummel, Howard Hughes and TWA(Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institute Press, 1991),pp. 58-63.47. Ibid, p.69.48. Ibid.49. The New York Times, April 18, 1944. [Title, author, p?]50. Contract between the United States of America andHughes Tool Company, dated May 5, 1944, Air Force CaseHistory, microfilm frames 1443-49.51. Report of Committee on Project MP-7, Nov 17, 1944,Air Force Case History, microfilm frame 1527.52. Lt. Colonel E. W. Dickman, Contract W33-039 AC-1079 - F-11 Airplane Impediment to Contract, Feb 17,1944, Air Force Case History, microfilm frame 1370.53. U.S. Senate, Congressional Session 80-1,Investigation of the National Defense Program, Part 43:Aircraft Contracts Hughes Aircraft Co.[hereafterHearing, Part 43], p. 27173.54. Review of D-2, D-5, F-11 Project, p. 3, D-2, D-5, F-11Project Book, Vol. II, NM-6, Entry 22, Record Group 18,National Archives, College Park, Md.55. Barton, Howard Hughes and His Flying Boat,pp.134-35. Senate Hearings, p. 24505.56. Carl Byoir & Associates, “Howard Hughes inRelapse - Condition Worse,” date stamped Jul 15, 1946,Howard R. Hughes File, American Association forAeronautics Collection, Library of Congress, Washington,D.C. [hereafter AIA File].57. Ibid.58. Carl Byoir & Associates, “Army Air Force PlanesSalute Howard Hughes,” date stamped August 8, AIA File.59. G. F. Smith handwritten not to General Craigie,attached to Routing and Record Sheet, Subject: XF-11Airplane - Test Pilot, Dec 26, 1946, XF-11 File.60. Col. George E. Price to Commanding General,Wright Field, Aug 28, 1946, F-11 File.



X-15B: Pursuit of Early O


L. Parker Temple, III

Orbital Human Spaceflight

T he North American X–15 hypersonic researchaircraft was among the most successful of allthe X-series. A cooperative research program

among the U.S. Navy,Air Force and the National Ae-ronautics and Space Administration (NASA), theX–15 exceeded all expectations as it expanded theknown flight envelope. When the program ended af-ter 199 flights, the U.S. was well along the pathtowards operational space vehicles and humanspaceflight.

An orbital version, variously called theAdvanced X–15, Orbital X–15, or X–15B, began inpart with the original proposals for the X–15 call-ing for a two-seat version. The concept endured ata low level for several years, reaching a peak ofinterest in 1958-1959. When mentioned at all sub-sequently, the X–15B has been relegated to littlemore than a footnote, and understood as the logicalprogression for much of the X-series aircraft push-ing higher, faster and farther.1

Justifying the X–15B as simply pushing theflight envelope outwards is as misleading as mak-ing the same argument for MERCURY. Higher,faster and farther might be felt as an imperative ora characterization of aviation’s evolution, but it wasnot the end in itself. The orbital X–15 answeredvery different motivations.

The Role of Human Presence - 1950s Style

The U.S. space program began in the militarylong before NASA’s 1958 creation. The military de-veloped the sine qua non of any space program: thelaunch vehicles. The military also had all the plans,concepts and strategies receiving any funding (how-ever meager) in the early 1950s. “Artificial moons”were so radical that many of the senior militaryleadership only vaguely understood them. Especiallyin the Air Force, experience with robotic aircraft col-ored any understanding of robotic spacecraft.

Tenuous attempts in World War II usingrobotic (now called unpiloted) aircraft showed seri-ous limitations. Lessons learned from theseattempts exposed the real bias: human presencecaused operational utility. This remained the mili-tary consensus for decades after World War II.Robotic aircraft of the 1950s, such as the SNARK,REGULUS, MATADOR and MACE, were akin tobut far less capable than today’s cruise missiles. Allsuffered from rudimentary technology inadequateto the senior military leadership demands for effec-tive and reliable weapons. Progress was erratic.These early programs indicated to the militaryleadership that they held some interesting ideas,but were hardly reliable or operational.

On October 5, 1954, the National AdvisoryCommittee on Aeronautics’ (NACA) High-SpeedFlight Station executive committee faced the finaldecision to proceed with a hypersonic research air-craft. Lockheed’s Clarence “Kelly” Johnson alonefavored robotic aircraft to explore the flight regimesproposed for the X–15. He firmly believed inhuman presence for operational (that is, practicalapplication) missions, as opposed to purely aerody-namic research. At the time, he was developing theU–2 spyplane and thinking ahead to hydrogen-fuelled hypersonic reconnaissance aircraft.2 Per-haps he thought a robotic aircraft could answerspecific questions related to hypersonic aircraftsooner than a piloted aircraft, facilitating the devel-opment of operational aircraft he had in mind.Everyone else believed human presence was man-datory.3 NACA’s associate director for research,Gus Crowley, summed up the majority view: thesuccessful X–1 program owed much to its pilots,whose performance allowed accomplishment ofthings robotic aircraft could not do.4 This revealsthe mindset that truly useful and operational capa-bilities required human presence.

This was the mindset, then, in the earliest daysof the military’s (and hence the nation’s) space pro-gram. Robotic devices were so limited, based onexperience with robotic aircraft, that human pres-ence would inevitably be needed to achieve anyoperational military capability.

What benefits might human presence provide?A contemporary list simultaneously contrastedperceived benefits of human presence versusrobotic spacecraft technological shortfalls. Sincehuman presence counteracted robotic spacecraftshortfalls, the list was considered a standardagainst which to measure military space progressin the 1950s:

Decision Making CapabilityRobots cannot perform “rapid and accurate deci-sion making…by ‘on the spot’ assessment of the sit-uation.”Command Control CapabilityHumans understand and react faster than robotcomputational speeds.Determination of Vehicle and Payload StatusHumans monitor the spacecraft’s status in situ,whereas robots require relay to the ground for pro-cessing.Post-Launch Changes in Mission PlanHumans perform more flexibly and readily adaptto new missions.Payload RedundancyHumans can “augment certain payload func-


Dr. L. Parker Temple works on space programs as a systems engineer, but also has a second careeras an historian. He was a career Air Force officer, combining a career of flying, promulgating spacepolicy and space systems acquisition. Recently, he was honored by his election as a Fellow of theAmerican Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and was the author of AIAA’s best selling book,Shades of Gray, National Security and the Evolution of the National Reconnaissance Office. He cur-rently lives in Virginia.

(Overleaf) X–15A #3 inflight.

A COOPERA-TIVERESEARCHPROGRAMAMONG THEU.S. NAVY,AIR FORCEAND NASA,THE X–15EXCEEDEDALL EXPEC-TATIONS

tions…in the event of payload subsystem break-downs.”Mission Data RedundancyRemote, unobserved sensors might not report accu-rately; human presence can verify or deny sensors’reports.Mission Data AugmentationRobotic sensors are specialized with limited capac-ity for recording data. Humans can take inputsfrom many sources and integrate a complete pic-ture of a situation.Recovery of On-Board Payload DataFor a spaceplane, the ability to choose a landingsite is crucial to returning the mission’s data. Pilotsroutinely do this.Early Mission Termination and RecoveryHumans can determine when to return or extendthe orbit. Robots might suffer, at any time, “missiontermination based on on-board programming.”Accomplishment of Mission DetailsHumans can adjust sensors to “optimize the gath-ering of mission data.”Subsystem ComplexityHumans are “a general-purpose subsystem with ageneral-purpose compute capability to store andanalyze events.”5

These claims about the value of human presencereflected Air Force doctrine drawn from decades ofatmospheric flying. Air Force Headquarters person-nel, lacking any basis for judgment without actualhuman spaceflight experience, accepted these claims.Artificial moons might provide important interimcapabilities, but as was the case with the robotic air-craft, only human-piloted spaceplanes had opera-tional utility.

Clearly, the bias towards human presence thatalso anticipated robotic spacecraft would not bevery capable was soon overturned as the U.S.devoted considerable resources and its best mindsto the space program. The bias, however, is impor-tant to consider when judging the initial push formaking the X–15, or any piloted vehicle, into anorbital spacecraft.

With this contemporary expectation of thevalue of human presence, and to really place theX–15B in context, we next need to understand thecontext itself: the flurry of activity surroundingspaceplanes in the mid-1950s.

Higher, Faster and Farther?

Although interest in spaceplanes was longstanding, serious studies of orbital spaceplanes andhigh-speed rocket aircraft skimming across theupper edges of the sensible atmosphere began rightafter World War II. These studies extrapolated thefirst operational rocket planes flown by theGermans during the war. Each of the Services hadsome variation under study at a very low level.

For instance, the Navy received a proposalfrom Douglas Aircraft for a third generation of itsD–558 series of research aircraft in 1953. Thatrocket plane, later part of the Douglas proposal for

the X–15 competition, was to achieve one millionfeet altitude and nearly orbital speed, later scaledback to a more modest 750,000 feet and Mach 9.However, the project remained a paper study even-tually yielding to the X–15.6

Bell Aircraft Corporation submitted a seminalproposal to Wright Air Development Center(WADC) on April 17, 1952. The premier X-seriesaircraft developer had hired Walther Dornberger asa rocketry consultant. The World War II comman-dant of Peenemunde for development and launch ofthe V–1 and V–2 rockets, Dornberger had beenWernher von Braun’s former superior officer. Hepushed for manned hypersonic rocket-launchedgliders based on the pre-World War II ideas ofEugen Sänger and his wife Irene Bredt.7

Bell examined air launch of its X-series aircraftto achieve orbit, and proposed a new operationalmanned bomber-missile, BOMI. WADC offeredBell a one-year study to advance the concept, andasked for two examinations—a suborbital, hyper-sonic version and an orbital version. Bell combinedboth into a phased development from suborbital toorbital flight. A year’s effort showed little progress.Dornberger’s constant lobbying kept BOMI alive.By his estimate, he eventually gave some 900 pre-sentations to all sorts of audiences on BOMI andsuccessor spaceplanes.8 His politicking worked,because in April 1954, Bell received another smallcontract to study an advanced reconnaissancebomber concept, designated MX-2276. This versionof BOMI resembled the suborbital vehicle of thefirst phase in the original WADC study. Like itsmore famous successor, the DYNA-SOAR—for itssuborbital (dynamic soaring) flight regime—MX-2276 was a nuclear weapon delivery system thatcould do its own post-strike reconnaissance.

Reconnaissance was critically important at thetime. Closure of the Soviet Union’s borders createda desperate need for Western intelligence aboutSoviet intentions.9 President Dwight D. Eisen-hower chartered a Technological Capabilities Panelto examine preventing a Soviet surprise nuclearattack. Throughout 1954, this effort identified anumber of critically important steps the nation hadto take. Among these were the developments of theLockheed U–2 spyplane and the CORONA satellitereconnaissance system. These programs werecovert; that is, not merely classified but hiddenwith their existence unacknowledged.

Meanwhile, the threat of surprise attackremained palpable, and the Services went abouttrying to solve the problem. On January 4, 1955,Air Research and Development Command (ARDC),anticipating the release of a General OperatingRequirement (GOR) then in final coordination,released System Requirement 12 for an advancedreconnaissance aircraft with 3,000 nautical milerange and a ceiling of 100,000 feet. A month later,Air Force Headquarters released its equivalent,higher-level GOR 12, to proceed under WeaponSystem 118P, the Special Reconnaissance System.By September 1955, Bell’s support to WS-118Pincluded further BOMI studies.10


SERIOUSSTUDIES OFORBITALSPACE-PLANES ANDHIGH-SPEEDROCKET AIRCRAFT SKIMMINGACROSS THEUPPEREDGES OFTHE SENSI-BLE ATMOS-PHEREBEGANRIGHT AFTERWORLD WAR II

Air Force studies of a more advanced recon-naissance-bomber began in March 1956. TheHypersonic Weapon And Research andDevelopment System (HYWARDS) was to achieveMach 12 flight, twice that of the X–15 then on thedrawing boards.11

Also, Bell got another contract for a highlyadvanced U–2 follow-on called BRASS BELL,Reconnaissance System 459L. Two months later,ARDC released System Requirement 126 for arocket-bomber, ROBO. ROBO allegedly included areconnaissance version combining radar, infraredand optical scanning sensors, with relay of the sen-sor information to the ground while the ROBO wasstill in flight.12

Working cooperatively with NACA Langley forthe aerodynamics research, the HYWARDS teamsoon realized that Mach 12 was insufficient, andthat Mach 15 “was about the lowest speed forwhich an attractive military boost-glide missioncould be defined.”13 From there, it seemed but ashort step to Mach 18 (nearly orbital), which thegroup recommended in January 1957.

The plethora of spaceplanes formed a logicalsequence, with HYWARDS to fly in 1965, BRASSBELL in 1968, followed by ROBO in 1974.14 Theproliferating concepts begged for consolidation. AirForce Deputy Chief of Staff (Development) Lt. Gen.Donald Putt reviewed the programs in January1957. He thought BRASS BELL and HYWARDSwere complementary and could be combined into asingle, two-phase program. Furthermore, theX–15A would clearly provide nearly everythingthat could be learned from HYWARDS. Thus, inApril 1957, Putt directed ARDC to combine allhypersonic research programs into a single devel-opment plan.15

NACA was also struggling with spaceplaneconcept diversity. For instance, NACA Ames andNACA Langley were at odds over the relativeadvantages of high and low lift-to-drag ratios. Withonly that one variable in mind, the range of studiesand technologies was very large, indicating the con-siderable work necessary to explore various partsof the high speed flight regime. The Ames-Langleydisagreements were technical, political and organi-zational. They serve to highlight the complexity ofthe issues involved in advancing spaceplanes. Therange of options was simply so extensive that nosingle correct solution would readily reveal itself.16

Within this swirl in both NACA and ARDC,WADC produced a reasonable response to Putt’sdirection for a unified development plan.HYWARDS,BRASS BELL and ROBO became three steps in anabbreviated program of development on December21, 1957.17 The combined effort was designatedSystem 464L, named DYNA-SOAR I, with a pro-jected first flight in July 1962.18

Strategic Air Command was the operationalhome for a variety of space uses, not the least ofwhich were those embodied by DYNA-SOAR.Strategic Air Command’s General Curtis E. LeMayintended DYNA-SOAR I as an advanced bomber,reconnaissance, air defense and space defense vehi-

cle.19 The DYNA-SOAR project elements convey afeeling for the broad range of capabilities thatspaceplanes might accomplish: Manned CapsuleTest; Boost-Glide Tactical Weapon Delivery; Boost-Glide Interceptor; Satellite Interceptor; GlobalReconnaissance; and Global Bomber.20

Well aware of Putt’s impending reorganizationof spaceplanes, on the 54th anniversary of the firstflight by the Wright Brothers, December 14, 1957,Air Force Chief of Staff General Thomas DresserWhite announced “The missiles that are getting theheadlines today are but one step in the evolutionfrom aircraft to piloted spacecraft.”21

Three days later, General White told the SenateArmed Services Committee that the X–15 “was aforerunner of the spacecraft…[and] requires all thecharacteristics that one would find in a mannedsatellite to take care of the man.”22

Human Orbital Spaceflight: Be First or BeUseful?

As rapidly as technology advanced, producingthe first crucial operational space systems withintwo years of SPUTNIK (such as the CORONA,GRAB and POPPY reconnaissance satellites), theperception remained that these were really onlyinterim capabilities awaiting routine human pres-ence. The appropriate question, therefore, was notwhether human spaceflight was needed, but rather,when it could be provided. Obviously, sooner wasbetter than later.

By 1956, Air Force Project 7969, the MannedBallistic Rocket Research System23 was competingdirectly with the Army Ballistic Missile Agency’sconcept for a recoverable system on an Army mis-sile (which became MERCURY). These bioastro-nautics research programs aimed at the minimumrequirements to put humans in space and returnthem safely to Earth. These minimalist programswere not ends unto themselves, but simply neces-sary stepping-stones to operational missions.

The earliest design work on the X–15B datesfrom this period. Project 7969 was an importantbridge between the minimalist and the robust, inthat the proposals received from industry includedboth ballistic re-entry vehicles and winged vehicles.Perhaps the most interesting proposal was NorthAmerican’s proposal for an evolved X–15. Usingstaged boosters, the aircraft would orbit between250,000 (perigee) and 400,000 feet (apogee). Thefirst stage comprised three NAVAHO boosters;24

another NAVAHO booster as a second stage; andthe X–15B was the third. Its estimated gross liftoffweight was 720,000 pounds. Since the X–15Bwould have the same shape as the X–15A, nothingfurther was considered necessary for determiningits flight characteristics. However, re-entry wouldonly get the pilot to a safe ejection altitude, withthe X–15 being lost in the Gulf of Mexico. NorthAmerican’s claimed cost and schedule were $120million and 30 months. This was not very satisfac-tory, as it was a very expensive, one-time shot withno residual operational utility.25 Nevertheless, the


STRATEGICAIRCOMMAND’SGENERALCURTIS E.LEMAYINTENDEDDYNA-SOAR IAS ANADVANCEDBOMBER,RECONNAIS-SANCE, AIRDEFENSEAND SPACEDEFENSEVEHICLE

idea opened a door. After all, Putt’s realization thatmost of HYWARDS’ results could be gained fromthe X–15 meant that a version of the X–15 could beon a growth path to ROBO’s operational mission,recently subsumed into DYNA-SOAR I. Never-theless, making the X–15A withstand the expectedre-entry heat and stress meant the X–15B would bea radically different vehicle in detail.26

Things stood there when the Soviets launchedSPUTNIK on October 4, 1957, and the emphasis onspace programs changed.

The VANGUARD project to launch an artificialmoon during the International Geophysical Year,seen as the US’ competitor to SPUTNIK, was farfrom success. The military were the only source ofresponse to SPUTNIK. The problem was not a lackof alternatives, but choosing the right one.

As a champion for spaceplanes and a militaryspace visionary, General LeMay, by that time theAir Force Vice Chief of Staff, took a personal inter-est in satellite and human spaceflight. LeMayannounced the Man-In-Space-Soonest (MISS) pro-ject, causing the re-orientation of a number of on-going studies and projects. Project 7969 got foldedinto MISS as one of the alternatives.27

Because of Project 7969’s inclusion in MISS,MISS might sound like MERCURY. MERCURYbegan in the Army and eventually transferred tothe new NASA after 1958. This was essentially theminimum system to put a human into space andsafely return. Little weight or space remained foroperational missions. This is not minimizingMERCURY’s importance in demonstrating criticallife support technologies and human spaceflightcapabilities. However, MERCURY’s limitationssimply served to underscore the military objectionsto NASA’s human spaceflight approach.

MISS’ emphasis was on attaining operationalcapabilities from space at the earliest possible time.Interim steps might be needed to understandhuman physiology and life support systems, but thegoal was operational uses. Competing ballistic re-entry and lifting re-entry (spaceplane) conceptsabounded, though with scanty data available fordesign. By 1957, Boeing’s DYNA-SOAR embodiedthe Air Force’s goal, providing a means to put mili-tary humans into space to perform militarily usefuloperational missions. DYNA-SOAR’s urgentlyneeded capabilities were a long way off, with itsexpected first flight in 1962.28

To grasp the range of alternatives, aside fromthe Air Force’s own concepts, WADC held govern-ment-industry meetings January 29-31, 1958. Inaddition to discussing NACA projects, the Air Forceinvited 11 major contractors for an hour and a halfapiece to brief concepts for achieving early humanspaceflight.29

NACA Langley discussed Max Faget’s researchon a ballistic vehicle (basically the MERCURY cap-sule) and John V. Becker described work being doneon a triangular planform that would use lift duringre-entry to provide great flexibility in landing sites.After these informal discussions, the serious workgot underway with the contractors. The final pre-

sentation was from North American Aviation, whodescribed turning the X–15 aeronautical researchaircraft into an operational (non-expendable)spaceplane.30

The MISS project alternatives grouped intothree basic categories: ballistic vehicles, boost-glidevehicles and satelloids. Ballistic vehicles wereshapes like ballistic missile nose cones intended tosurvive re-entry. The boost-glide vehicles wouldachieve nearly the same velocity, but would skimthe upper reaches of the atmosphere as gliders atlower altitudes. Satelloids were basically glidersthat would achieve minimum orbital velocity wellabove the atmosphere and use their aerodynamicfeatures for re-entry.31

In February 1958, LeMay reviewed the alter-native paths from the WADC conference. For themost part, the ballistic re-entry idea was the mostcompetitive if the goal were limited to getting intospace for no other point than having gotten there.That remained operationally unsatisfying becauseit could not be tied to some useful purpose. TheArmy’s MERCURY capsule was one ballisticapproach having no residual operational utility, butthe Air Force had an alternative with an opera-tional tie-in.

The SAMOS E-6 photoreconnaissance satelliterequired a very large re-entry capsule because boththe film and the camera were to be recovered forreuse.32 Unlike the blunt re-entry capsule of thefamiliar MERCURY design, the SAMOS capsuleused a scaled-up General Electric RVX-2 missilere-entry nose cone.33 Like CORONA, the SAMOSE-6 needed a plausible explanation for its launches.CORONA’s cover story was the DISCOVERERresearch program. SAMOS used human spaceflightto explain the large size of its vehicles. Like MER-CURY, the scaled-up RVX-2 was minimally largeenough to fit a human inside, and was one alterna-tive under Project 7969.34 Also, the MISS version ofthe SAMOS capsule had little residual operationalcapability. In the case of SAMOS, however, theMISS version was secondary cover for an opera-tional photoreconnaissance system. Since thehuman spaceflight story protected a classified mis-sion, losing human spaceflight programs to NASAjeopardized the more important mission. Thus, inpart, the Air Force objected, in support of the Army,to assigning human spaceflight responsibility toNASA.35

Such wingless, ballistic shapes had the advan-tage of simplicity, but serious disadvantages if any-thing other than basic bioastronautics was thegoal. Bell’s MISS boost-glide alternative designteam pointed out that “wingless would only be astunt.”36

The second alternative path comprised boost-glide vehicles, including LeMay’s favorite, DYNA-SOAR, undergoing initial source selection at thattime.

Satelloid vehicles constituted the third alter-native path, and included the X–15 that alreadyhad the first functional full pressure space suit andflew at the edge of space. The X–15A program per-


GENERALLEMAY, BYTHAT TIMETHE AIRFORCE VICECHIEF OFSTAFF, TOOKA PERSONALINTEREST INSATELLITEAND HUMANSPACE-FLIGHT

formed experiments inspired by the need for earlyDYNA-SOAR technology work. The X–15A was anideal testbed for X–20 technology, but it also pro-vided an apparent path to an earlier, though morelimited, orbital capability. Making an orbital X–15variant might be the fastest way to get real opera-tional capability, while also resolving much of theflurry of proliferated spaceplane concepts. With anestimated much shorter (by half) development timethan the boost-glide vehicles, the X–15B could alsodemonstrate critical technologies for DYNA-SOAR.37

While all three alternatives continued to moveforward, each having merit for different reasons,the heat shortly got turned up on the ballistic re-entry approach.

In April 1958, Maj. Gen. John B. Medaris, com-mander of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency, toldCongress that he had recently asked for authorityto launch a human on a JUPITER-C rocket andreturn him to Earth. He and Wernher von Braunclaimed they could do this a year after direction toproceed. The Army and, after the concept’s transferto the new civilian space agency, NASA called itMERCURY.38, 39

MERCURY was the fastest way to get humansinto space and safely return them. Nearly asquickly, though, the X–15 might do far more interms of residual capabilities. The MISS partici-pants had all estimated between one and two anda half years to get a human into space and safelyreturn (with two notable exceptions, whose esti-mates were more realistic at 5 years). Ballistic re-entry shapes had the shortest development times.40

Nevertheless, the X–15 was designed to fly atthe edge of the atmosphere at about one quarter oforbital speed. It already had to handle many of thephysiological problems associated with orbitalflight. The X–15 had shown it could handle sub-orbital flight, demonstrating its advanced capabili-ties on a regular basis. Orbital flight demandedlong duration in space, so the X–15’s life supportsystem needed significant upgrading. Neither wasits structure sufficiently durable to dissipate theheat of re-entry. Still, in theory, transforming thetechnologically mature X–15 into an operationallyuseful orbital spaceplane might be faster than anyalternative.

Yet, by late 1957, interest in the orbital X–15Bapparently evaporated, according to the sourcesthat even discuss its existence. Hallion suggestedthat the MERCURY program overtook the orbitalX–15B. However, MERCURY could not overcomeits absence of residual operational utility. Jenkinsclaimed the X–15B drifted quietly away.41 Heassumed DYNA-SOAR (which became the X–20 in1958) required too much attention by the Air Forcefor serious attention to be paid to the X–15B.Neither answer is entirely satisfactory.

What was the reality?

Instead of drifting quietly away, the X–15Bstudies became classified in 1957, allowing only

spotty unclassified appearance of X–15B-relateditems.42 Reasons exist to believe interest in theX–15B shifted from WADC to the WesternDevelopment Division, home of the military spaceprogram.43 Lacking external visibility due to classi-fication, the X–15B might seem to have receivedsporadic interest.

Instead, it the X–15B as a viable proposalintended to achieve human spaceflight early whileretaining some operational capability had not goneaway. Instead of simply paving the technologicalway for the DYNA-SOAR, the serious possibilityarose that the X–15B might achieve orbit earlier, asthe DYNA-SOAR ran into significant technologicalproblems. DYNA-SOAR’s truly unique problemsresulted in its clearly falling behind, so it was noton the path to the earliest human spaceflight.

As the Air Force cast about for a suitable oper-ational response to SPUTNIK, the X–15B mightprovide not only an early capability, but one thatalso possessed some operational utility - not as areplacement for DYNA-SOAR, but as an interim.Thus, as DYNA-SOAR slipped to the right, theX–15B retained interest. In addition to its antici-pated earlier orbital flight possibility, the X–15Bobjectives to demonstrate and prove technologiesfor the DYNA-SOAR and satellites seemed to comeat a low cost per spaceflight while retaining resid-ual operational utility.

Had the X–15B become a competitor to theDYNA-SOAR? By November 1959, the X–15Bstudies advanced far enough to answer the keyquestions about making the X–15 orbital, alsoanswering whether the X–15B had become theDYNA-SOAR’s competitor.

Harrison Storms, North American’s LosAngeles Division vice president and chief engineer,conducted the work.44 Recently declassified finalreports, SATURN/X–15 Flight Research ProgramReport, and its companion, Technical SummaryReport, SATURN/X–15, at last give insight intothe fate of the X–15B.45

X–15B Program Overview

The detailed studies of the X–15B’s design andflight operations demonstrated the move from sub-orbital to orbital flight was larger than had beenanticipated.

The X–15B program comprised four initialorbital flights. A “series of tests for attaining…national objectives” would “make substantialcontributions to the development of vast numbersof concepts and components envisioned for futurespace systems.”46 Building on the X–15 flightresearch program’s capabilities, the X–15B addedunique tests and experiments while slightly over-lapping the MERCURY and CORONA/DISCOV-ERER programs. Four flight profiles exemplifiedthe possible kinds of missions and planning. At thetime, actual mission plans anticipated having toawait the timing and progress from other programssuch as MERCURY and CORONA/DISCOVERER.

The X–15B differed sufficiently from its flight


THE X–15AWAS ANIDEAL TEST-BED FORX–20 TECH-NOLOGY,BUT IT ALSOPROVIDED ANAPPARENTPATH TO ANEARLIER,THOUGHMORE LIMITED,ORBITALCAPABILITY

research cousin that it needed qualification flighttests using the Boeing B–52 Stratofortress. Launchalternatives were air launch from a B–52 or theNorth American B–70 Valkyrie, contrasted withvertical launch aboard a Convair ATLAS or MartinTITAN rocket. Clusters of rockets were also a pos-sibility, since the ATLAS and TITAN boosters alonewere insufficiently powerful. These and otherlaunch vehicle combinations reflected the emphasison early human orbital spaceflight in the MISSprogram. By 1959, the studies had narrowed down

the most direct, simplest and preferred method,which was the NASA SATURN.

Unlike its flight research forebear, the X–15Bwould deliver up to 5,000 pounds of payload withits pilot and test director for 48-hour missions.Clearly, that was more than a simple evolution ofthe X–15A.

Advanced did not necessarily imply completelynew, however. For instance, in the X–15’s proposalphase, each bidder had to address a Navy require-ment for a second crewmember.48 Also, for theJanuary 1958 initial source selection of the System464L, DYNA-SOAR 1, North American proposed a15,000 pound-class vehicle based on the X–15Boperating as a satelloid.49 This idea recurred whenbioastronautics requirements firmed up in 1960.50

The X–15B studies kept such concepts alive.Typical of the orbital research profiles was the

first test carrying 4,068 pounds of equipment to500,000 feet. During 32-orbits, the crew were toconduct tests such as:

Optical and radio telescopyInfrared, radar and visual terrestrial observationsHuman mobility in spaceBiological researchGravitational research.

The list illustrates the range of experiments anddemonstrations, from theoretical scientific data gath-ering to practical applications with immediate utility.

The X–15B would fire retro-rockets during the32d orbit, maneuvering for re-entry at 350,000 feet(as they thought) at 25,500 feet per second (fps).Twenty-five minutes of high-lift gliding flightwould reduce these to 8,000 fps at 150,000 feet. Theremainder of its flight to touchdown would mimicthe X–15A, minimizing the number of unknowns in


X–15B Cutaway ShowingSecond Cockpit, PayloadBay and Additional Thrusters. 47

Wind Tunnel Model ofX–15B In LaunchConfiguration From B-70

the X–15B flight profile. Thirty-two orbits drovesome of the X–15B’s sizing parameters. Bottledoxygen for two days in orbit imposed considerableweight penalties, making necessary a regenerativeoxygen system for which no room existed in theX–15A.51

After understanding the first flight and mak-ing any changes, the second flight would push thealtitude envelope. This flight profile evolution wasa normal flight test approach. The second orbitalflight would start from the same parameters as theinitial flight, but then boost to 1,584,000 feetapogee (300 statute miles), with a 500,000 footperigee. The third flight test would begin fromthese same elliptical orbital parameters anddemonstrate aerodynamic braking and rendezvoustechniques.52 The fourth and final test flight wouldpush the maximum altitude to 3,168,000 feet (600statute miles) to intensify the re-entry test. In addi-tion to tests of magnetic and gravitational fields,meteorite and radiation measurement and massspectrometry, the flight profile included re-entrycharacteristics and guidance tests.

Altitude increases came at the expense of pay-load weight, because total weight remained about

the same. Converting all the payload weight to fuelcould have resulted in a 1,900 statute mileapogee.53

Orbital construction might also justify theX–15B. Operational human presence requiredspace stations. Space station size outstripped thelargest launch vehicles, requiring orbital construc-tion. Conserving robotic spacecraft weight byreducing redundancy could save money. Therefore,it was “important that the concept of manual main-tenance in space be investigated early in the spaceresearch program.”54

Design Details55

The final detailed design work assumed theSATURN S-1 launch vehicle. The S-1 had1,500,000 pounds of thrust, and necessitated amodified TITAN second stage with a single XLR-87engine. Alternative second stages were the SAT-URN S-II or S-IV (for additional thrust of 80,000 or800,000 pounds, respectively).56 The X–15Bretained its XLR-99 rocket from the flight researchprogram, but added eight Rocketdyne XLR-101rockets in the aft fuselage for retrograde thrust atthe end of the mission.

A large dorsal payload bay approximatelyamidships had two sets of power-driven doors,accommodating a wide range of sensors and equip-ment. The compartment could be segmented foradditional fuel tanks. The X–15B would not deploysatellites but operate installed sensors and equip-ment for the mission and return these, providing aversatile and reconfigurable operational vehicle.57

Surprisingly little information exists on theX–15B’s anticipated size. Contradictory existingdata at times indicates it was the same as theX–15A, or a much larger vehicle. An oxygen regen-eration system, second crewmember and the longpayload bay indicate that the X–15B would havebeen similar in planform, but necessarily scaled upfrom the X–15A.

The structures of the X–15A and X–15B arethe most revealing part of the studies, indicatingthat the X–15B had to be radically different.Reentry heat loads were a major problem with sig-nificant unknowns. The best available data on theupper atmosphere, above the highest altitudes ofballoon measurements, came from EXPLORER 1,which led to conservatism in estimating the poten-tial heat loads – meaning the requirements encom-passed the worst potential case. By the end of 1959,the worst-case heat loads were the ones that drovethe skin and internal structure of the X–15B.

The X–15A’s 1,200o F nose temperature andthe wing leading edges 1,250o F allowed its skin tobe Inconel X, a high strength nickel-chromium-ironalloy. In reality, the highest heat load on the X–15Awas 1,250o F (although the X–15A-2 was laterthought to be capable of 2,400o F at Mach 8+).However, the X–15B’s heat loads were nearly triplethat of the hypersonic research aircraft, reaching3,400o F on the nose and 4,900o F on portions of theleading edges. The X–15B’s leading edge structural


Two SATURN Variants ForX–15B Launch.

THIRTY-TWOORBITSDROVE SOMEOF THEX–15B’S SIZING PARA-METERS

materials ranged from thorium oxide near the wingroots to beryllium oxide from mid-span to wingtip.Materials for the wing leading edge protective coat-ings ranged from columbium (good up to 2,800o F),molybdenum (3,000o F), graphite (3,800o F) andfinally, tungsten (4,750o F). The trailing edgesmight have been Rene’ 41.58

The internal structure of the fuselage also hadto deal with high heat loads, and the X–15A’s tubu-lar steel and titanium structures were not up to there-entry challenge. The X–15B needed a coatedmolybdenum structural box.59

Getting the X–15B to orbit proved harder thanexpected. After 26 months of design, fromDecember 1959 to February 1962, fabricationwould be paced by the availability of the first flight-rated engine in October 1962 (the 34th month ofthe development). With first vehicle delivery inJanuary 1963, glide tests would have followed 4

months later. The second vehicle would extendspeed and altitude by adding two droppable exter-nal fuel tanks. Finally, the first launch vehicleboosted flight using a dummy second stage wouldhave been in March 1964, with orbital flights inJune 1964 and every 2 months thereafter.

This schedule killed any expectation that theX–15A was a short step away from orbital flight.Also, as for its being a potential competitor to theDYNA-SOAR, the technology problems provednearly identical, driving the long developmentschedule. Importantly, in 1959, DYNA-SOAR 1’sscheduled first suborbital flight in July 1962 wasnearly two years ahead of the X–15B’s June 1964schedule (both of which would in reality have beenafter John Glenn first American orbital flight in aMERCURY capsule). Hindsight shows both sched-ules were unachievable, although the X–15B had asmattering of greater realism because of the


Arrangement of HighTemperature Materials

BOTH DYNA-SOAR 1[AND] X–15BSCHEDULESWEREUNACHIE-VABLE

X–15A’s on-going and highly successful flightresearch program.

While the nation’s civil space program, by thattime, was focussing on going to the Moon, the mili-tary space program had demonstrated the exten-sive capabilities of robotic spacecraft. As the last

glimmer of interest in the X–15B waned in late1959, the X–15B had not justified its continuedsupport as a way to achieve early human space-flight, or as a technology testbed for more advancedsystems, or as a competitor for the first operationalhuman spaceflight capability.


1. The most authoritative source on the X–15 programdevotes parts of two pages and occasional snippets to theproject, by far the most extensive discussion before thispaper (Jenkins, Dennis R., Tony R. Landis, Hypersonic –The Story of the North American X–15 (North Branch,Minn: Specialty Press, 2003) pp. 209-210). The otherauthoritative source on hypersonic research programswas Richard P. Hallion’s comprehensive two-volume work(Hallion, Richard P., The Hypersonic Revolution (Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio: Special Staff Office, 1987)Vol. I, p. I-x), whose scant references to the X–15B sug-gested that concept was successively shelved and revivedfor years, finally yielding to the MERCURY capsule.None of the sources, however, adequately explains thedesignation change of the X–15 to the X–15A. This is usu-ally not mentioned, or discussed only as it applies to theheavily redesigned X–15A-2 (with external fuel tanks). Itwould appear that the redesignation may actually havebeen tied to the serious pursuit of the orbital X–15, neces-

sitating a “B” to differentiate its significant differencesfrom the X–15 research aircraft, subsequently designated“A.”This supposition, however, seems equally unprovable.Readers interested in the X–15 program itself should alsorefer to sources such as Jay Miller, X-Planes: X-1 to X-45;Milton Thompson, At the Edge of Space; and RobertGodwin, X–15: The NASA Mission Reports.2. Johnson, Clarence L., M. Smith, Kelly: More ThanMy Share Of It All (Washington, D.C: SmithsonianInstitution Press, 1985); Rich, Ben R. and Leo Janos,Skunk Works – A Personal Memoir of My Years atLockheed (New York: Little, Brown and Company, 1994),pp. 169-174. Johnson was seemingly aware of and moreconcerned with how to meet the Air Force’s GeneralOperating Requirement 12, the Special ReconnaissanceSystem, discussed below, released within a few months ofthis meeting.3. Jenkins and Landis 2003, p. 19.4. Ibid; Crowley, Gus. “Minutes of the Meeting, NACA


Final Thoughts

Of course, the X–15B never went beyonddesign studies. At the same time, it was very mucha part of the swirl of evolving spaceplane conceptsin the 1950s, and very much a part of the rush toput the first human into space. It was an interest-ing excursion into the “what ifs” of aerospace his-tory.

More than any other program, it demon-strated the difficulties of extrapolating a researchaircraft into a spaceplane. The studies disprovedthat the technological maturity of the X–15 couldeasily bootstrap an operational orbital spaceplaneprogram. The X–15B studies identified the sametechnology problems facing the much moreadvanced DYNA-SOAR X–20, eliminating its fur-ther consideration as a means to mature technolo-gies for the latter program. Its demise can now besaid to be understandable.

Yet, in the X–15B, we see things that wereboth logical and yet to come. The external fueltanks eventually flew aboard an X–15A for thesame purpose as proposed in the X–15B. The dor-sal payload bay flexibly containing sensors, exper-iments or additional fuel later made eminent senseas part of the Space Shuttle.

The studies straddled the transition of roboticspacecraft from crude demonstrations to the firstoperational capabilities without human presence.Robotic capabilities advanced faster than expected

by those whose experience consisted of robotic air-craft programs. The rush to put humans in spacefor national defense or security reasons died a slowand lingering death, as enthusiasm largely damp-ened out based on robotic spacecraft success, com-bined with the high cost technically challengingaspects of human spaceflight.

As an epilogue, a little over two years after theX–15B studies, having pushed DYNA-SOARbeyond achievability, Defense Secretary Robert S.McNamara said, given “the absence of a clearlydefined military manned space mission, presentmilitary efforts should be directed to the establish-ment of the necessary technology base and experi-ence upon which to expand, with the shortest pos-sible time lag, in the event firm military mannedspace missions and requirements are establishedin the future.”60 Against the earlier perception ofthe need for human presence to achieve true oper-ational capabilities, robotic spacecraft progressedso rapidly that, by June 1, 1962, Director ofDefense Research and Engineering Dr. HaroldBrown told Congress he could not define a require-ment for military manned space systems. “I thinkthere may, in the end, turn out not to be any.”61

The military human spaceflight tide hadchanged. No shortcuts to operational humanspaceflight existed, then or now. But, instead of thepath not taken, what might the U.S. space pro-grams have been like, had the X–15B and space-planes been pursued? ■

NOTES

(Left) Artist’s Concept ofthe Spaceplane That MightHave Been

Illustration of X–15B onSATURN S-1/S-IVEmphasizing AdditionalPropellant For HigherAltitude Missions andShowing The ArrangementFor The Ejection Seats

NO SHORTCUTSTO HUMANSPACE-FLIGHTEXISTED

Committee on Aerodynamics,” October 4-5, 1954(Washington, D.C: Files of the NASA History Office).5. Murray, Arthur, Man’s Role in Dyna-Soar Flight(Seattle, Wash: The Boeing Company, August 1962,declassified 1965), D2-80726; Temple, L. Parker III,Shades of Gray, National Security and the Evolution ofthe National Reconnaissance Office (Reston, Va:American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics,2005), pp. 135-137. The latter contains a more completelist, explanation and critique of the list.6. Aviation Week, Mar 10, 1958, p. 39.7. Hansen, James R., Engineer in Charge (Washington,DC: National Aeronautics and Space Administration,1986), NASA SP-4305, p. 356; Becker, John V., “TheDevelopment of Winged Re-entry Vehicles, 1952-1963,”unpublished, May 23, 1983, copy in NASA LangleyResearch Center Historical Archive. Dornberger evenpushed to have Bell Aircraft hire Sänger, but this neverworked out.8. York, Herbert F., Arms and the Physicist: AnEyewitness Report on a Half Century of Nuclear-AgeDrama (New York: Springer-Verlag, 1994), Vol. 12, p. 129-130. Former Director, Defense Research and Engineering,Dr. Herbert York says Dornberger proudly recalled thenumber to show how indecisive the US government was.To York, however, it only proved how persistentDornberger was.9. Hall, R. Cargill, C.D. Laurie, eds. Early Cold WarOverflights – 1950-1956, Symposium Proceedings(Washington, D.C: National Reconnaissance Office,2003), passim.10. U.S. Congress, House, Committee on GovernmentOperations, Organization and Management of MissilePrograms, 86th Congress, 1st Session, Sep 2, 1959, HouseReport 1121, p. 127.11. Becker 1983, 20; Hansen 1986, pp. 367-368.12. Aviation Week Feb 3, 1958, p. 26.13. Becker 1983, p. 15.14. Temple 2005, p. 134.15. Bowen, Lee, The Threshold of Space: The Air Force inthe National Space Program, 1949-1959 (Washington,D.C: USAF Historical Division Liaison Office, 1960), p.23; Hallion 1987, Vol. 2, pp. 1989. This idea that technol-ogy needs could be met in another program not directlyrelated would come back in the more advanced DYNA-SOAR. The designation X–15A is used in this paper toconsistently refer to the hypersonic research aircraft,despite the fact that the designation was not used in theearly part of the program.16. Becker 1983, pp. 18-19.17. Hallion 1987, Vol. 2, p. 209; Temple 2005, p. 134.18. Hallion 1987, Ibid. Note the advancement in theschedule from the early three-phased program. Aftercombining the projects, first phase development timereduced by three years.19. Headquarters, Air Research and DevelopmentCommand, “System Development Directive 464L,”December 21, 1957, pp. 2, 8, 11, 32; Headquarters, AirResearch and Development Command, Detachment 1,“Preliminary Development Plan, System 464L,”November 1958; Butz, J.S. Jr., “Orbital Re-Entry WillIntensify Demands On Structures,” Aviation Week &Space Technology, April 21, 1958, pp. 50-51. I chose theDecember 21 date because it records the formalization ofa decision reached in the Air Force on October 10 collaps-ing the efforts into one program. When General Whitespoke in mid-December, the decision to create DYNA-SOAR out of the other programs was already publiclyreleased.20. Bowen, Ibid.21. White, General Thomas D., “Leadership — in theConquest of Space,” address to the Air Force Academy,December 14, 1957.22. Gantz, Lt.Col. Kenneth F., ed., The United States Air

Force Report on the Ballistic Missile – Its Technology,Logistics and Strategy (New York: Doubleday andCompany, Inc., 1958), p. 277.23. Jenkins and Landis 2003, p. 209.24. NAVAHO was a supersonic, rocket boosted, ramjetpowered cruise missile under development for the AirForce. Subscale models, designated X–10, flew in the mid-1950s, but the project was cancelled in favor of theATLAS missile. At the time of the X–15B studies, theNAVAHO was in serious technical trouble, but repre-sented an approach well understood by North Americanengineers.25. Jenkins and Landis, Ibid.26. Syvertson, Clarence A., “Visit to WADC, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, to attend conference onJanuary 29-31, 1958, concerning research problems asso-ciated with a man in a satellite vehicle,” Memorandumfor Director, February 13, 1958, pp. 8-9, in theHeadquarters NASA History Office X–15 files.27. Hallion 1987, Vol. 1, p. 8.28. Hallion 1987, Vol. 2, pp. 204-207.29. Syvertson 1958, p. 1.30. Syvertson 1958, p. 9. Becker’s responsibilities hadincluded getting the X–15 program going and later serv-ing as NASA’s project manager on DYNA-SOAR. His“lessons learned” version of the WADC meeting is inHallion 1987, Vol. 1, p. 411. The eleven MISS alternativesto early human spaceflight covered the gamut fromspheres to missile re-entry nose cone adaptations, to the“stripped” X–15B and winged re-entry vehicles likeDYNA-SOAR. Of note in his summary of the 11 alterna-tives was the absence of Boeing’s DYNA-SOAR boost-glide vehicle, which was already well underway, butwhose schedule did not fall within the bounds of attain-ing early human spaceflight. In its place, the only boost-glide vehicles presented were the Northrop and Bell pro-posals for DYNA-SOAR.31. I owe the satelloid-boost-glide distinction to Hallion(Hallion 1987, Vol. 1, p. 210), which I expanded to differ-entiate the ballistic vehicles such as the blunt MER-CURY capsule, spheres, and missile re-entry shapes. Thisdistinction of Hallion’s is especially important to under-stand the difference between the final version and expec-tations of the X–20 and the original DYNA-SOAR 1.Originally designed for one purpose as a boost-glide vehi-cle, circumstances forced it into regimes it was not wellsuited to operate as a satelloid, which was a major part ofthe projects undoing.32. Temple 2005, p. 325; Perry, Robert L., A History ofSatellite Reconnaissance, Volume IIB – SAMOS E-5 andE-6 (Washington, D.C: The National ReconnaissanceOffice, October 1973, declassified September 2002), pp.424-427; Day, Dwayne A., “A Sheep in Wolf’s Clothing,”Spaceflight, 44, October 2002, p. 10. SENTRY, the origi-nal designation of the Air Force photoreconnaissance pro-gram under WS-117L, changed to SAMOS in Aug 1959.For narrative simplicity, SAMOS is used consistentlyhere. Several versions of the SENTRY capsules hadremoved much of the photoreconnaissance equipmentreplaced by human spaceflight equipment (and crew).These latter concepts were essentially packaging studies,to see whether a human and associated support could befit into the space left by removing the camera. In somecases, the capsule itself was extended to include bothcamera and human, but that defeated the cover story byhaving an outwardly distinguishable capsule for recon-naissance and one for human spaceflight. The packagingwas related to the launch vehicle-driven maximum cap-sule diameter. The SAMOS E-6 was to use a scaled-upTITAN II re-entry vehicle. To accommodate the large for-mat camera, the E-6 was approximately 12 feet long and8 foot across at the base, easily large enough for a seatedastronaut. The CORONA program expended the camera,returning only the film, allowing (in early models) a much


smaller size. Day’s article covers the rest of the attemptsto mix human spaceflight with various SENTRY/SAMOScapsules, such as in the E–3 and E–5.33. Hallion 1987, Vol. 1, p. lxxviii.34. As explained in this article, the most common asser-tion about the X–15B is that it kept getting shelved andrevived. This paper shows greater continuity behind theX–15B investigations, though some may find it interest-ing to note that the up-scaled human spaceflight versionof the RVX–2 enjoyed its own shelving and reintroductionin the early 1980s. The concept was briefly alive again inthe very early days after the establishment of Air ForceSpace Command. The author of this article was calledupon to review this proposal while assigned to Air ForceSystems Command at the time.35. Temple 2005, p. 325; Day, Dwayne A., John M.Logsdon and Brian Latell, eds., Eye in the Sky—The Storyof the CORONA Spy Satellites (Washington, D.C: Smith-sonian Institution Press, 1998), p. 74.36. Hallion 1987, Vol. 1, p. 411. Heroic human presenceas fundamental to real capabilities was popularized inTom Wolfe’s best-selling book, The Right Stuff, minimiz-ing the role of humans in the orbital MERCURY cap-sules.37. Temple 2005, p. 144; Hallion 1987, Vol. 1, p. 411.38. Swenson, Lloyd S., Jr., James M. Greenwood, andCharles C. Alexander, This New Ocean: A History ofProject Mercury, (Washington, D.C: National Aeronauticsand Space Administration, 1966), pp. 78-80.39. Temple 2005, p. 144.40. Syvertson 1958, p. 11. Syverston sketched each ofthe basic shapes and then detailed important aspects ofeach of the 11 concepts, one being the estimated develop-ment time to manned spaceflight.41. Jenkins and Landis 2003, Ibid.42. Gantz 1958, pp. 296-297. In testimony before theSenate Committee on Armed Services’ PreparednessInvestigating Subcommittee, referring to the “mannedsatellite,” General Schriever said he preferred “not to sayanything more about the program that has been underdiscussion…because of its classification.” WhenCongressman Weisl clarified the question referred to theX–15, Schriever explained that the X–15 was not a satel-lite, but a rocket-powered airplane. Senator Barrettresponded, “Yes, I understand that, General, but I wasthinking about an extension of the X–15, and it would beperfectly agreeable to wait for executive session.”Schriever explained its relationship to the hardware thenin existence supporting the ballistic missile program.Experimental recovery flights were possible with existinghardware, he claimed. The testimony was on December17, 1957 and January 8-9, 1958.43. This effort comprising only studies is very difficult toreconstruct. Western Development Division was indeedinvolved in the evaluation and possibly sponsorship ofthe X–15/SATURN in 1959, when Jenkins and Hallionindicate it had been shelved. The two Air Force develop-ment centers responsible for aircraft and satellites had alengthy rivalry on the topic of spaceplanes. Each centerhad its own ways to extend aircraft technology higherand faster to become satellites or to make satellite tech-nology capable of aerodynamic flight. I suspect that, asinterest in the X–15B waned at Wright Air DevelopmentCenter, it was either picked up briefly or worked collater-ally at Western Development Division. This is not yetprovable. I documented some of this rivalry relating tospaceplanes in Shades of Gray.44. Jenkins and Landis 2003, Ibid.45. North American Aviation Report, SATURN/X–15Flight Research Program Report, November 19, 1959, NA59-1586, SECRET original declassified by NASAHeadquarters, 9 and passim; North American AviationReport, Technical Summary Report, SATURN/X–15,November 19, 1959, NA 59-1247, SECRET original

declassified by NASA Headquarters, passim. Thesenewly declassified reports were obtained through FOIAfrom NASA Headquarters.46. North American Aviation Report, NA 59-1586, p. 5.47. North American Aviation Report, NA 59-1586,restored from the original by Ms. Betty Temple, as withall drawings in this article.48. Jenkins and Landis 2003, p. 28.49. Hallion 1986, Vol., 1, pp. 209-210.50. Jenkins and Landis 2003, p. 163.51. The X–15 life support system used oxygen stored incanisters, sufficient for short duration atmospheric mis-sions, but not for long duration orbital missions. Addingmore oxygen bottles would be costly in terms of weightand performance, as well as operationally limiting. Orbi-tal flight would have required some form of regenerativebreathing system. At the time, the rule of thumb that onepound into 100 nautical mile orbit required 100 pounds offuel and launch vehicle was unknown, but the expense ofextra weight was appreciated.The X–15B studies showeda good anticipatory understanding of the kinds of trade-offs between fuel and payload each profile represented.52. North American Aviation Report, NA 59-1586, p. 6.53. North American Aviation Report, NA 59-1586, p. 29.54. North American Aviation Report, NA 59-1586, p. 12.55. For a more detailed description of the technicaldetails of the X–15B, see Temple, L. Parker III, “X–15B:The Spaceplane That Almost Was,” Paper presented atthe 57th International Astronautical Congress, Valencia,Spain, October 2006, IAC-06-E4.3.01.56. North American Aviation Report, NA 59-1247, 8.57. The payload bay was narrow and long, apparentlydisplacing one fuel tank from the original X–15 design.Interestingly, surviving cutaway drawings in the techni-cal reports show a dorsal payload bay, but do not removethe internal fuel tank, which is contradictory.58. North American Aviation Report, NA 59-1247, pp.95, 102; North American Aviation Report, NA 59-1586, p.96. Interestingly, at the same time columbium was con-sidered the material for the X-20 DYNA-SOAR, but theamount required exceeded the world’s annual productionof the element. Had both continued, there would havebeen competition for resources to complicate their acqui-sition.59. Jenkins and Landis 2003, pp. 179, 181; Hallion 1986,Vol. 1, pp. 35-37; North American Aviation Report, NA 59-1247, pp. 95, 102.60. Carter, Launor F., Interpretive Study of theFormulation of the Air Force Space Program(Washington, D.C: US Air Force History Office, February4, 1963), pp. 3, 16.61. U.S. Congress, House, Committee on GovernmentOperations, 85th Congress, 2nd Session, June 4, 1965,House Report 445, p. 82; U.S. Congress, Senate,Committee on Aeronautical and Space Sciences, NASAAuthorization for fiscal year 1963, 87th Congress, 2ndSession, June 1962, p. 348. This was hardly the end of thepush for military human spaceflight, but the subsequentabsence of such programs speaks volumes about the real-ities. Conceptual studies replaced the efforts aimed atactually developing flying systems, as both Air ForceSystems Command’s Aeronautical Systems Division andits Space and Missile Systems organization/SpaceSystems Division pursued concepts variously namedAerospaceplane, Trans-Atmospheric Vehicles, ReusableAerodynamic Space Vehicles, and other names. These arecovered in more detail in Temple, 2005, passim Improvedrocket technology and other advances brought space-planes back into vogue in the late 1980s with theNational Aerospace Plane (NASP). However, neither theNASP nor any of its predecessors were ever considered tobe the key to operational uses of space - robotic spacecraftremain unchallenged for their operational utility to thisday.



Chasing the XB


George J. Marrett

B–70A Valkyrie

Hold your position,” crackled theEdwards Command Post over the UHFradio, “We are changing your mission,

the number two XB–70 Valkyrie has crashed.”The date was June 8, 1966, and I was acting as

an instructor pilot in a T–38 Talon. My student, sit-ting in the front cockpit, was a Strategic AirCommand (SAC) colonel obtaining some super-sonic flight experience in the T–38 before checkingout in the SR–71 Blackbird. We had preflighted ouraircraft and were preparing to start engines whenwe received the chilling call. At the time I was afighter test pilot assigned to Flight Test Operationsand involved with testing the F–4C Phantom,F–5A Freedom Fighter and F-111A Aardvark.Colonel Chuck Yeager was the commandant of theTest Pilot School when I attended in 1964. Beforemy assignment to the school I had been an inter-ceptor pilot in Air Defense Command for four yearsflying the F-101B Voodoo. So I was a very experi-enced pilot and prepared to complete any taskassigned to me by the Command Post.

It did not surprise me when I heard that anXB–70 had crashed. In the year and a half I hadbeen acting as a safety chase pilot flying a T–38,F–4 or F–104, the XB–70 had many close calls.While the official Air Force name for the XB–70was Valkyrie, North American Aviation, builder ofthe aircraft, called it The Great White One. Becauseof all the mechanical problems the aircraft experi-enced, we safety chase pilots called it Cecil, the SeaSick Sea Serpent. It did resemble a sea creaturewith its long thin neck and curved body andbecame sick on every test flight that I can recall.

Chase pilots routinely accompanied the XB–70on every flight. We flew a loose formation positionabout 100 feet abeam the test aircraft, and lookedfor fuel or oil leaks, smoke trailing behind any partof the plane, missing side panels or any otherunusual conditions and called them to the atten-tion of the XB–70 test pilot. We had to be alert; air-craft problems occurred on every flight, some werevery serious.

“One of these days Cecil will stub its toe and godown,” I had previously predicted to other pilots.

Little did I realize then the strange and ironicsequence of events, which had occurred to makeJune 8, 1966, one of the darkest days in Edwardsflight test history.

Moments later the Command Post reported tome that the XB–70 had crashed about 35 milesfrom Edwards, just north of Barstow, California

and directed us to take off and orbit over the crashsite acting as a radio relay. We would relieve aT–33, which had been above the scene providinginformation on the unfolding events, but was run-ning low on fuel and needed to return to Edwards.Additionally, a helicopter had been scrambled fromEdwards to recover survivors, but would not arrivefor another 10 or 15 minutes. We were directed toorbit overhead and relay information since theCommand Post could not maintain line-of-sightradio contact with the helicopter while it was onthe ground.

As soon as we were airborne in the T–38, Ispotted black smoke from the XB–70 crash sitedrifting up to around 10,000 feet into the clear blueMojave sky. As the rescue helicopter approachedthe crash scene, we relayed a report from theCommand Post to the chopper pilots to look for evi-dence of another downed aircraft, a NASA F–104.Parts of the XB–70 were still burning intensely, apicture that is still fresh in my memory even afterforty-one years. I knew all the XB–70 pilots andmany of the NASA pilots. Death was becoming acommon visitor in the test community; I feared itspresence again.

Orbiting over the smoking ruins, I recalled thefirst time I saw the XB–70 when I was a student inthe test pilot school. Visiting the North AmericanAviation facility at Palmdale, California, I watchedthe incredible XB–70 roll out into the aviation spot-light of the world. The long-secret plane looked likea hooded cobra inside the shadows of the hugehangar where final assembly had been completed.The majestic plane, covered with a special whitepaint to resist the searing temperature of air fric-tion, was designed to ride on its own shock wave. Itsneedle-like nose was shaped to push aside airbeneath the triangular wing. The tips folded down65 degrees to provide the same type of lift as thewave under a high-speed boat.

The aircraft was gigantic, 196 feet long with a105-foot wingspan and twin 30-foot vertical tails.Even the air ducts, which supplied air for sixGeneral Electric J-93 engines were huge, measur-ing seven feet high and eighty feet long. Theengines themselves were in the 30,000-pound class,gulping air through twin ducts controlled by a verycomplex and troublesome intake system. The eightlanding gear tires appeared to be sprayed with analuminum-colored paint, giving the Valkyrie a sci-ence-fiction image. Weighing in at 550,000 pounds,the XB–70 was in a class by itself.


George J. Marrett, from Grand Island, Nebraska, was a test pilot for the U.S. Air Force and HughesAircraft Company. In 1968-1969 he flew 188 combat missions in Vietnam as a Douglas A–1E Skyraider“Sandy” rescue pilot in the 602nd Fighter Squadron (C), C for Commando, flying from Udorn andNakhon Phanom Royal Thai Air Force Bases in Thailand. After retirement from Hughes Aircraft in1989, he became one of the founders of the Estrella Warbird Museum at the Paso Robles, California air-port where he owns and flies a 1945 Stinson L–5E Sentinel. In the last four years he has published threebooks: Cheating Death: Combat Air Rescues in Vietnam and Laos by the Smithsonian Institute Press,Howard Hughes: Aviator by the Naval Institute Press, and Testing Death: Hughes Aircraft Test Pilotsand Cold War Weaponry by Praeger Security International. The Naval Institute Press will publish hislatest book, Contrails over the Mojave, in Spring 2008.

(Overleaf) North AmericanAviation XB–70A Valkyrieflying over Edwards AFB,1965. (All photos courtesyof the author.)

“HOLD YOURPOSITION,WE ARECHANGINGYOUR MISSION, THENUMBERTWO XB–70VALKYRIEHASCRASHED”

To complete flight tests at Mach 3, the XB–70flew a huge circular flight path covering the fiveWestern states of California, Nevada, Idaho, Utahand Arizona. Frequently a Convair B-58 Hustlerwith another XB–70 test pilot at the controls wouldfly a Mach 2 circle over the ground, staying insidethe XB–70’s flight path. That way another test pilotwith intimate knowledge of the XB–70 couldquickly join up and render assistance if needed.Also, an F–104 was pre-positioned at MountainHome Air Force Base, Idaho, or Hill Air Force Base,Utah, ready to join up in formation if the XB–70needed to land at either base or one of the drylakebeds in that area.A massive armada of supportaircraft was required for each XB–70 flight, similarto the X-15 rocketship missions.

My mind flashed back to the many flights Ispent chasing the Valkyrie as it performed flighttest maneuvers. Due to hydraulic, electrical orother mechanical failures occurring on practicallyevery flight, several safety chase aircraft flew withthe XB–70 during its test mission. A T–38 usuallyaccompanied the XB–70 on both takeoff and land-ing, confirming that the landing gear worked prop-erly. The takeoff chase pilot launched first, climbedover Rogers Dry Lake, and pulled up into a down-wind pattern opposite the heading of the XB–70,which was awaiting start of takeoff roll on Runway04. Due to the complexity of the XB–70 landinggear operation, the takeoff safety chase crew per-formed what we termed an “in-flight-pickup.”Whenthe XB–70 pilot called on the UHF radio, “Rollingin 30 seconds,” the T–38 pilot timed the start of his180-degree descending turn so as to be directlyabeam the XB–70 as it lifted airborne. Standardpractice called for the XB–70 test pilot to delay gearretraction until the T–38 pilot moved in under theaircraft and was in a position to watch the complexgear retraction motions. One of the other XB–70

test pilots frequently rode in the rear cockpit of myT–38 and confirmed correct gear retraction.

While flying safety chase, I had observed land-ing gear malfunctions many times. I saw the fourtires on one gear arranged perpendicular to theground—an eerie sight. Once I even saw the entirelanding gear rotated 90 degrees away from thefuselage centerline, a condition that would requirethe test pilots to eject if it could not be corrected.There was always a sense of impending doom asone flew near this beautiful Mach 3 bird; disastercould be only moments away.

Another time, while I was flying in the backseat of an F–104D piloted by fellow fighter testpilot Capt. Joe Stroface, the XB–70 pilots asked usto fly directly under the XB–70 and visually checka landing gear linkage in the wheel well. TheF–104 had a T-tail extending about 8 feet higherthan the pilot’s head, so vertical clearance of ourtail and the underside of the XB–70’s lower wingwould be a very critical factor. Stroface deftly flewthe F–104 not more than twelve to fifteen feetdirectly underneath the XB–70. Meanwhile, I wasabsolutely terrified without my own hands on theflight controls and throttle to assure myself that wewould not collide. I pressed my body as low in thecorner of the upward ejection seat as I could—knowing full well that this position could not possi-bly save me if we did collide. But taking any actionat that moment made me feel better.

Early in the XB–70 flight test program, the J93engines could not be restarted in-flight unless theaircraft was flown to at least 0.8 Mach, an excessivespeed to have as a standard procedure. NorthAmerican Aviation and General Electric engineerssuspected that an irregular fuel pattern was toblame. The engineers requested that I fly a T–38with a North American Aviation photographer inthe rear cockpit and attempt to position the aircraftdirectly behind the engine exhaust nozzles so thatphotographs could be taken of the fuel pattern. Iflew the nose of the T–38 to within fifteen feet ofthe engine exhaust nozzles, and slightly low so thephotographer could aim his camera directly abovemy flight helmet and into the nozzles. Flight proce-dures had not been published nor briefed to safetychase pilots on any special precautions to be takenin flying very close to the XB–70. We simply reliedon close verbal communications with the XB–70test pilots and used whatever flight control move-ments were required to slide into position and staythere. We were considered part of the test pilot fra-ternity and expected to use good judgment. We gotthe photos.

The most demanding and dangerous personalexperiences I encountered with the XB–70 beforethe accident of the second aircraft involved flyingformation in supersonic flight. North AmericanAviation management wanted photographs of theXB–70 with the wing tips at their full down posi-tion of 65 degrees.The aircraft took off with the tipsat zero degrees, or level. As the plane accelerated to500 knots the tips were lowered to 30 degrees.Above Mach 1.2 the tips were placed full down.


Capt. George J. Marrett fly-ing chase on NorthAmerican XB–70A Valkyrie,1965.

THE ENGINEERSREQUESTEDTHAT I FLY AT–38 WITH ANORTHAMERICANAVIATIONPHOTO-GRAPHER INTHE REARCOCKPIT ANDATTEMPT TOPOSITIONTHE AIRCRAFTDIRECTLYBEHIND THEENGINEEXHAUSTNOZZLES

Aircraft flying at supersonic speeds create shockwaves, which can be heard by an observer on theground. The pilot in the supersonic aircraft doesnot hear this shock wave. He just feels slightchanges in his flight controls and sees a momen-tary hesitation in his airspeed indicator aroundMach .95 until it jumps to over Mach 1. The NorthAmerican photo would have to be acquired near theshock wave.

The XB–70’s shock wave had a great impact ona chase plane flying in formation both from a visualand aerodynamic perspective. Portions of the shockwave were visually observed as an optical distor-tion of the XB–70 airframe. In high school physics,we see the effect of placing a pencil in a glass ofwater. Due to the difference of index of refractionbetween air and water, the pencil appears to bebent or displaced as viewed by the eye. This sameeffect occurred with the Valkyrie, the plane was notexactly where I visually observed it.

A shock wave came off both the XB–70’s noseand tail, gradually bending back at a greater angleas the plane accelerated faster and faster. It wasimportant for the pilot in the photo chase plane tofly forward of the shock wave created by theXB–70’s nose, thereby flying in undisturbed air. Ifhe got behind the shock wave, the F–104D, with tiptanks installed in the tandem cockpit version, didnot have enough engine power to punch backthrough the wave. Because this shock wave is actu-ally a cone surrounding the supersonic XB–70, achase aircraft will also experience a different effecton the wing nearest the XB–70 while flying in theshock wave. This disturbance caused the chaseplane’s nose to oscillate becoming very “squirrelly.”Many chase flights were flown before we got thatperfect supersonic photo.

As we circled over the crash scene in the T–38,I watched the helicopter land and recover NorthAmerican Aviation’s chief XB–70 test pilot, Alvin S.

“Al” White. Al White, age 48 was born in Berkeley,California, and joined the Army Air Corps in 1941.He served first as an advanced flying instructorbefore going overseas. White spent two years in theEuropean Theatre flying the P-51 Mustang in sixmajor campaigns, including the Battle of the Bulge.He received an engineering degree from theUniversity of California in 1947. White then joinedNorth American Aviation as an engineering testpilot and participated in the flight testing of theF–86 SabreJet, F–100 SuperSabre, the F–107 andSabreliner business jet. Al White was severelyinjured in the accident with back and arm injuries,but survived. However, he never flew the XB–70again.

The helicopter crew reported they had foundone fatality and we relayed that message to theEdwards Command Post. Later I would find outthat the pilot killed was Maj. Carl C. Cross, age 41from Chattanooga, Tennessee. Carl Cross was anAir Force bomber/cargo test pilot flying his firstXB–70 flight as copilot. He earned his BS degreethrough the Air Force Institute of Technology pro-gram at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio andattended the test pilot school in 1960. Cross was aquiet unassuming type, just back from a combattour in Vietnam. Ironically, after a year dodgingground fire in the war, he was killed in the skiesover the Mojave Desert. His death was a tremen-dous loss to those of us who knew him at the FlightTest Center.

Several months before the accident, I hadflown as copilot on a Lockheed C–141 Starlifter;assisting Carl Cross perform “speed-power” perfor-mance tests. He had allowed me to make severaltouch-and-go landings in the Starlifter at the end ofthe mission. This was a tremendous thrill for me asa fighter pilot, a chance to fly what was then themost modern and advanced Air Force militarytransport. Follow-on versions of the C–141 flew forover 40 years but have now all been retired.

Only two XB–70s, serial numbers 62-0001 and62-0207, were ever built. The second and mostadvanced model was the one involved in the acci-dent. As a result of this mishap, the remainingXB–70 was grounded pending results of one of themost extensive accident investigations ever per-formed at the Flight Test Center.

The final accident report stated that the pilotsof the XB–70 had completed their scheduled testflight. At the end of the flight, General Electric(maker of the Valkyrie jet engines) requested a pho-tographer take publicity photos from a civilianLear Jet. The photos would show four differentfighter-type aircraft (F–5, F–4B, T–38 and F–104)all equipped with General Electric engines, joinedwith the XB–70 in formation flight.

It was during this formation flight that theaccident occurred. The F–104N, serial numberN813NA, flown by Joe Walker, NASA’s chief testpilot at Edwards, who was on the XB–70’s rightwing, collided with the larger aircraft. The collisioncaused the F–104 to disintegrate and ripped off allthe XB–70’s left vertical tail and half of its right.


Capt. George J. Marrettstanding in front ofNorthrop T–38A Talon atEdwards AFB, 1964.

A SHOCKWAVE CAMEOFF BOTHTHE XB–70’SNOSE ANDTAIL, GRADUALLYBENDINGBACK AT AGREATERANGLE ASTHE PLANEACCELE-RATEDFASTER ANDFASTER

MANY CHASEFLIGHTSWEREFLOWNBEFORE WEGOT THATPERFECTSUPERSONICPHOTO

Without the vertical tail to provide directional sta-bility, the XB–70 fell into an uncontrollable spin.From the wreckage of both planes, it was quicklydetermined what caused the accident. Why theaccident occurred was never determined precisely.

When two aircraft fly in close wing formation,they disrupt the airflow on the wing closest to oneanother. Their wing tip vortices are slightly modi-fied, causing each wing to produce a small increasein lift. With two similar aircraft in formation, eachpilot unconsciously holds a little “aileron into” theother aircraft. When the two aircraft are of greatlydifferent wing size and sweep angle, as the casewith the XB–70 and F–104, the relatively smallF–104 experienced a much, much larger effect.

As automobile drivers, we sense the airflow offa large truck as we go around it on the highway athigh speed. Our steering wheel must be slightlyturned into the truck to maintain a straight coursedown the highway. As we pull in front of the truckwe must remove this small steering angle toremain aligned with the road. We make these cor-rections automatically, sometimes without evenbeing aware of it. Pilots don’t look at their controlstick any more than drivers look at their steeringwheel. To maintain a safe position requires contin-uous visual contact of the other vehicle and smoothbut quick adjustment of the steering wheel, or inthe case of an aircraft, the control stick.

Joseph A.“Joe”Walker, age 45 from Washington,Pennsylvania was a very experienced pilot, a NASAtest pilot for twenty-one years. Walker earned a

degree in physics from Washington and Jeffersonbefore entering the Army Air Corps where he flewthe P–38 Lightning in World War II. Walker hadflown every experimental rocket aircraft from theearly Bell X–1 to the North American X–15, flyingthe X–15 to a world speed record 4,104 mph and arecord-breaking altitude of 354,200-feet. He hadthousands of hours in the air and had flown practi-cally every jet aircraft produced by the UnitedStates. In fact, Walker was scheduled to be the nextpilot to qualify in the XB–70.

Evidently Joe Walker was distracted for a splitsecond and drifted in too close to the XB–70’s rightwing or the strong wing tip vortices flowing off theXB–70 overpowered his ability to control the small-winged F–104, and his jet was pulled into physicalcontact. In either case, the destruction of his air-craft was total and his death immediate.

The black cloud, which flew with Cecil, contin-ued to darken the Mojave Desert. A couple of daysafter the accident, my friend Captain Joe Basquez,an Air Force helicopter test pilot, was ferrying mem-bers of the accident board between the crash site andthe Edwards flight line in a Bell UH-1 Huey.Basquez, age 31, was nicknamed “Jolly Joe” becauseof his magnetic personality and positive attitude. Hehad just graduated from the Navy Test Pilot Schoolat Patuxent River, Maryland, and was assigned toEdwards to test Air Force helicopters. After landingon the ramp, Basquez shut down his jet engine andstarted walking away. Suddenly a gust of windcaused one blade to arc down striking him in thehead. His severe injury required medical-evacuationto a Naval Hospital in San Diego. Basquez neverflew again. Likewise, the General Electric enginephoto flight was never attempted again.

After the accident board completed their inves-tigation, the one remaining XB–70 resumed flyingfive months after the crash. Unfortunately it wasthe number one aircraft that did not have all theimprovements made in the number two aircraft. By1967 the XB–70 was transferred to NASA andthirty-two additional test flights were accom-plished over the next two years. Fitzhugh “Fitz”Fulton, age 43 from Blakely, Georgia, and copilotEmil “Ted” Sturmthal, both test pilot friends ofmine, ferried Cecil, the Seasick Sea Serpent to itsfinal resting place at the National Museum of theUnited States Air Force on February 4, 1969.Sturmthal is credited with having said, “I’d do any-thing to keep the Valkyrie flying—except pay for itmyself!”

Flying safety chase on the XB–70 Valkyrie wasa thrilling experience, with never a dull moment. Itwas a challenge to fly far enough away to maintaina safe position and still be close enough to be ofvalue to the XB–70 test pilots. As chase pilots wealways flew with a great sense of caution and con-cern, never forgetting we were swimming througha great sea of air with a creature named Cecil,whose habits were not all known and whose verysize could consume us in a flash—as it did myfriends on that tragic day on the high MojaveDesert. ■


NASA test pilot Joseph A."Joe" Walker preflightingLockheed F–104 Starfighterat Edwards AFB, 1965.Killed in XB–70 / F–104crash.

AS CHASEPILOTS WEALWAYSFLEW WITH AGREATSENSE OFCAUTION


Aviator of Fortune: Lowell Yerex andthe Anglo-American Commercial Ri-valry, 1931-1946. By Erik Benson. CollegeStation: Texas A&M University Press,2006. Maps. Photographs. Notes. Biblio-graphy. Index. Pp. xii, 264. $45.00 ISBN: 1-58544-500-4

This is the story of an aviation pio-neer—one who can rightly be labeled “for-gotten.” Lowell Yerex built Central Ame-rican aviation in the 1930s, at one pointhandling more cargo than any other air-line in the hemisphere. But his workfailed to last—a victim to forces greaterthan mere business innovation.

As a British citizen with an Americanupbringing, Yerex struggled throughout toestablish his legitimacy with each govern-ment in order to gain government backingfor his ventures. Officially or not, airlines ofthe period required government backing,particularly in areas where governmentscompeted for influence. Central Americaand the Caribbean were such arenas ofrivalry between the U.S. and Britain. Yerexconsistently fell between the two stools: tooAmerican in his business style to garnerBritish trust and support, and untrustwor-thy to the U.S. because of his Canadianbirth. Besides, the U.S. preferred PanAmerican, already its carrier of choice inother areas and naturally enjoying power-ful sponsors in the bureaucracy.

Despite the obstacles, Yerex built anairline that provided vital connectivity inCentral America. He did so by innovating(critics called it cutting corners) and strip-ping down and modifying aircraft to fitlocal requirements (smaller runways intighter areas, oversized cargoes, and over-worked or bare-bones crews). While criticssaid he was violating safety standards, hisaccident record was good; and his airlinedelivered the goods. It became the nation-al airline of several countries in the 1930s.

Yerex was ambitious, of course. Hesought to tie his regional line to the U.S.through Miami. He also built a solid, ifsmall, Caribbean line. But he eventuallystretched himself too far, and the out-break of World War II put him in a bindwhen funding and equipment becametight and getting either required a patron.Yerex’s empire collapsed, and he fadedfrom history.

The book is interesting in its portray-al of Yerex’s building of an airline in a pre-viously unserved area of the Americas. Itshows a creative problem solver providingmuch needed support where the largerplayers opted not to go. Unfortunately, thebook is weak in explaining exactly howYerex got to be defined as a near outlaw.And presentation of the Anglo-Americanrivalry is a bit murky.

Benson performed a great deal ofresearch into government documents onboth sides of the Atlantic. Somewhat sur-prisingly, his documentation is short ofmaterial actually created by the centralcharacter. Perhaps the Yerex documentsare unavailable, but their absence is amajor deficiency. Government correspon-dence and reports are good sources for thedecision-making process, but they showlittle of Yerex’s motivation and the inter-nal workings of his businesses. Bensonhas done a good job of working around thegaps, but the gaps remain nevertheless.That said, within the limitations of theevidence, this work is solid aviation indus-try history and worth the time it takes toread it.

John Barnhill, Ph.D., Independent Scho-lar, Houston, Texas

No End in Sight: The ContinuingMenace of Nuclear Proliferation. ByNathan E. Busch. Lexington The Univer-sity of Kentucky Press, 2004. Maps.Tables, Diagrams. Illustrations. Notes. Ap-pendices. Glossary. Bibliography. Index.Pp. xiv, 490. $40.00 ISBN: 0-8131-2323-2.

Nathan Busch is an assistant profes-sor of political science at ChristopherNewport University in Virginia. Heinvested several years into the researchand preparation of this scholarly work,including a research fellowship at LosAlamos National Laboratory. In additionto this work, Busch has published severalarticles on the topic of nuclear weaponsand appears to be an active participant inthe ongoing dialogue of nuclear weaponsproliferation.

The book opens with an assessmentof the “optimist” and “pessimist” interpre-tations of nuclear proliferation. Essen-tially, the optimist perspective iteratesthat nuclear proliferation can be a posi-tive force for international stability, pred-icated on the idea that states with nucleararms will be more reluctant to engage inconventional conflicts for fear of escala-tion. The pessimist perspective asserts acontrary position predicated on a lack ofcredible evidence supporting the optimiststandpoint. Busch offers examples—pri-marily that of India and Pakistan, twonuclear powers—who have engaged inseveral conventional engagements, under-mining the optimist interpretation.

Busch asserts, through case studiesof the overt nuclear powers (e.g. the U.S.,Russia, China, India, and Pakistan; omit-

ting the UK and France for their assumedsimilarity to the U.S., and Israel, based onthe ultra-secretive nature of their nuclearweapons program), that the optimistinterpretation of nuclear proliferation isfundamentally fallacious. One of the cor-nerstones of this argument is that theU.S., assumed to be the most stable of thenuclear powers, has faced a number ofnear-crises throughout its period ofnuclear weapons possession. The authoralso examines nuclear proliferation in the“newly proliferating states” of Iraq, Iran,and North Korea. He also offers some the-ories on the assumed development ofnuclear weapons programs in thosestates.

The author strings together his argu-ments cogently and effectively. Based onthe idea that even the U.S. has had prob-lems with command and control, he main-tains that less stable polities would haveeven more troubles. This becomes mostobvious in his case study of Russia’s tra-vails with the other former Sovietrepublics and their legacy of nuclearweapons. Additionally, Busch maintainsthat a newly proliferating state may bethe most unstable for the purposes ofnuclear command and control andmateriel security.

Perhaps the only drawback in thework is that Busch failed to balance sec-ondary and primary sources. He relied ona large number of American primarysources ranging from interviews with per-tinent individuals to U.S. government doc-uments, but there is a noted lack ofsources from any of the other countriesanalyzed. He did review Indian, Pakis-tani, and Chinese newspapers and schol-arly articles from many of the statesincluded, but there are no “insider” docu-ments. Whether this was impossiblebecause of security or intentional on hispart is impossible to say because he didnot assess the sources he relied on.

Another criticism could be builtaround Busch’s failure to address twovery unique case studies in the history ofnuclear weapons: Libya and South Africa.While he mentions Libya’s claims to havegiven up the pursuit of nuclear weaponsin 2003, he doesn’t seem convinced thattheir abandonment of nuclear materialproduction was genuine. He never men-tions South Africa, even though it devel-oped nuclear weapons and then voluntar-ily abandoned them. It would have beeninteresting to have incorporated these twostates into his analysis.

On the whole, this work has a greatdeal of utility. While there are many worksavailable on nuclear proliferation, Busch’swork is timely with ongoing internationalevents. Now, more than ever, nuclear prolif-

Book Reviews

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eration stands as a hot-button issue, espe-cially if one buys the argument that theCold War was much less stable than usual-ly interpreted. The book’s conclusion alsoprovides a way ahead, with the recommen-dation that the pessimist approach tonuclear proliferation is preferable.

David J. Schepp, 332d Air ExpeditionaryWing Historian, Balad Air Base, Iraq

Spy Satellites and Other IntelligenceTechnologies That Changed History.By Thomas Graham, Jr., and Keith A.Hansen. Seattle: University of WashingtonPress, 2007. Photographs. Notes. Appen-dices. Glossary. Bibliography. Index. Pp.xvi, 171. $14.95 Paperback ISBN: 978-0-295-98686-7

The adage that “good things come insmall packages” certainly holds true forthis book. At first glance, some readersmight question whether so slender a vol-ume has substantial value. Within the firstdozen pages, however, most will recognizethey are holding a real nugget. Theauthors, both veterans of strategic armscontrol and disarmament negotiations overseveral decades, deliver a straightforwardanalysis of the importance of intelligence-collection technologies to making arms con-trol possible at the height of the Cold War.Had it been otherwise, the proliferation ofnuclear weapons might have underminedinternational peace and security.

While numerous books over the pastdozen years have explored the develop-ment of reconnaissance satellites and afew, like David Lindgren’s Trust But Verify(2000), have provided some explication ofthe relationship between that technologyand Cold War strategies or policies, SpySatellites has a distinctive focus. It empha-sizes the centrality of satellites and otherintelligence-collection systems in promot-ing arms control and disarmament.Graham and Hansen carefully define andexplain how “national technical means”(NTM), a purposeful euphemism for a hostof space, air, sea, and ground sensor sys-tems, enabled the United States and theSoviet Union to verify each other’s compli-ance with arms-control agreements.Space-based systems, more than anythingelse, ensured “verification”—the essentialability to unilaterally and reliably deter-mine that other signatories remainedfaithful to treaty obligations and did notjeopardize national security.

The authors explain how secrecy, his-torically, has had deleterious effects onverification. In the 1950s, the inability of

Western intelligence organizations to col-lect sufficient critical information aboutSoviet nuclear-delivery capabilities in-creased the risk of the United States over-estimating Soviet strength and misdirect-ing resources to unnecessarily expand itsown nuclear forces. Conversely, as hap-pened during the mid-1970s, poor dataand analytical inattention risked underes-timating Soviet capabilities and, ultimate-ly, leaving the United States vulnerable toa Soviet first strike. Employment ofsophisticated NTM reduced the risk ofmiscalculation by American and Sovietleaders. Furthermore, by ensuring credi-ble, effective verification of compliance,NTM paved the way for arms-control anddisarmament agreements from SALT I tothe Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.

This little book contributes in a bigway to helping us understand how NTM,especially reconnaissance satellites, wereevery bit as important as nuclear weaponsystems in deterring major war betweenthe Soviet Union and the United States.The ability to peer into each other’s home-land and accurately measure the otherside’s strategic forces, thereby avoidingpotentially catastrophic miscalculations,allowed the superpowers to change thecourse of history. Punctuating this historylesson, however, is the disquietingacknowledgment of limited NTM capabil-ity to monitor the presence and prolifera-tion of “weapons of mass destruction”(WMD), particularly the chemical and bio-logical variety, among rogue nations andterrorist groups.

The three-page postscript to SpySatellites warns, furthermore, that therelentless progression of weapons technol-ogy is making space a more dangerousplace. An arms race in space would under-mine that domain as a sanctuary for“important national monitoring capabili-ties,” which it has been since the 1960s.The authors insist that preservation ofinternational peace and security in thetwenty-first century depends on long-term preservation of space-based monitor-ing and verification capabilities. Albeit acomplicated undertaking with manyinterests to protect, they suggest craftinga “non-armament” agreement for spaceakin to the Antarctic Treaty of 1961 and,perhaps, built upon the Outer SpaceTreaty of 1967. This might be the onlyway to prevent a costly, destabilizing“weaponized space free-for-all” that woulddestroy the foundations previously laidfor a comprehensive, treaty-based armscontrol and disarmament regime.

Dr. Rick W. Sturdevant, Deputy Director ofHistory, HQ Air Force Space Command

The AEF Way of War: The AmericanArmy and Combat in World War I. ByMark Ethan Grotelueschen. New York:Cambridge University Press, 2007. Maps.Photographs. Notes. Bibliography. Index.Pp. x, 387.$75.00.ISBN: 0-521-86434-8

This book is a detailed examinationof the combat experience of the AmericanExpeditionary Force (AEF) during WorldWar I. Unlike most World War I historiesof American involvement in the “GreatWar,” Grotelueschen’s book goes beyondthe well known stories of Belleau Woodand the Argonne Forest to describe howthe AEF adapted to combat in France.Focusing on four AEF divisions, the 1st,2nd, 26th, and 77th, the author analyzestheir organization, training, and combatoperations from the time they are estab-lished following the American entry intoWorld War I in April 1917 until the end ofthe war in November 1918.In the process,he demonstrates how pre-war US Armydoctrine clashed with the realities oftrench warfare on the Western Front.

The first chapter examines the pre-war U.S. Army. Despite the opportunity tolearn from the lessons of combat since thebeginning of World War I in 1914, the USArmy remained totally unprepared forthe fighting raging on the Western Front.The senior leadership of the AEF, exem-plified by AEF commander-in-chiefGeneral John J. Pershing, retains a beliefin “open warfare,” a doctrine placing cen-tral emphasis on the individual infantry-man with rifle and bayonet. With this doc-trine, General Pershing hoped to breakthe stalemate on the Western Front. Asthe reader quickly learns, this “open war-fare” doctrine proved unworkable in thestatic trench warfare prevailing betweenthe Allies and Germany since late 1914.

In the following chapters, Grotelue-schen follows each of the four AEF divi-sions as it reached France and preparedfor combat. He examines how the officersand soldiers adjusted their tactics inresponse to initial combat experience. Theofficial U.S.Army doctrine evolved in mostcases to one of limited-objective, firepow-er-based, set-piece attacks requiringdetailed planning and preparation.Artillery, not the rifle, was the “king of thebattlefield” in World War I. The most suc-cessful at adapting to this new reality, the1st and 2nd Divisions, are considered thepremier AEF fighting units during thefinal months of World War I.

Through the combat experiences ofthese four AEF divisions, the reader gainsa new appreciation for the tremendousachievement of the United States armedforces. In only eighteen months, a small,inexperienced U.S. Army with few modern

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weapons expanded to a force of over twomillion men in Europe. Despite the illsuited pre-war doctrine of “open warfare,”the AEF adapted to meet the demands ofthe modern warfare of the Western Front.In so doing, it played a crucial role in win-ning World War I. The success of the AEFlays the foundation for the firepower-focused doctrine that prevails throughWorld War II and Korea. With the finalveterans of the “Great War” passing away,Grotelueschen provides a distinguishedcritique of their battlefield success. Hisbook is a must for anyone interested inWorld War I and the development of USArmy doctrine.

Maj. Jeffrey P. Joyce, USAF (Ret.), DocentNASM’s Udvar-Hazy Center

Shadow and Stinger: Developing theAC–119G/K Gunships in the VietnamWar. By William P. Head. College Station:Texas A&M University Press, 2007.Tables. Illustrations. Photographs. Notes.Glossary. Bibliography. Index. Pp. xii, 340.$49.95 ISBN: 1-58544-577-6

William P. Head, chief of the AirLogistics Center Office of History atRobins AFB, has contextualized develop-ment of the AC–119G and K gunshipsduring the Vietnam War. He desired tounveil the important role of the WarnerRobins Air Materiel Area (WRAMA) toremind readers of the significance of airlogistics centers in national defense. Inaddition, he used the AC–119 story to nar-rate the challenges of wartime innovationin the evolving strategic context of thewar and its ramifications for the air war.He also sought to provide a face to his his-tory, ensuring that readers remember thehuman element of war. Designed for ageneral audience, Shadow and Stingerblends broad explanations of the VietnamWar with detailed program history.

Head structured the eleven-chapterbook into three overlapping parts, the firstof which explained the conceptual historyof gunships. The story is well told and fol-lows the themes of earlier works, includ-ing Jack Ballard’s Development andEmployment of Fixed-Wing Gunships,1962–1972, and Richard Kott’s The Role ofUnited States Air Force Gunships inSoutheast Asia. Head judiciously ex-plained the perceived wartime need forgunships, the intellectual inspiration forthese weapons, and the efforts of juniorofficers to convince their superiors of theneed for them. For students of wartimemilitary innovation, the AC–119 story

becomes a classic case of innovation fromthe ground up and of the tension of clash-ing service cultures. Examples includedproponents of high flying and fast jets notdesiring the addition of low-and-slow-fly-ing converted cargo planes to the force;the desire of the Air Force not to lose theclose air support mission to the Army; andthe battles between Department ofDefense analysts and Air Force programmanagers.

In the second major section, by farthe largest, Head utilized previouslyunused archival material from theWRAMA archives and other sources toanalyze the project’s evolution, whichfocuses on WRAMA and contractor Fair-child-Hiller’s actions. Here he resumedthe trail first explored in the 1970s by AirForce historian Richard Maltais butadded the perspective of an additionalthirty years. These chapters, comprisingover a third of the book, provide a highlydetailed examination of contract changes,program requirements, theater headroomconcerns, and technical problems. Minu-tely traced through archival 1960’s min-utes, messages, briefings, letters, and con-tracts, Head’s account revealed theheadaches that project personnel experi-enced in re-equipping a 1950s cargo planeto perform a 1970s mission. Moreover, thegaining command never specified thespeed, weight, maneuverability, or opera-tional capacity that it required. WRAMAhad to develop two models of the same air-craft without clear guidance regardingmission profile, performance specifica-tions, or concept of operations. This aloneguaranteed frustration, delays, and costincreases.

Originally, Air Force leaders wantedto replace the AC–47 Spooky gunshipwith a C–130-based platform, but con-cerns over a shortage of theater airliftand the cost of developing a C–130 gun-ship forced consideration of other plat-forms. The service selected the fiftiesvintage C–119, agreeing upon two ver-sions. The “G,” known as Shadow andpowered solely by twin propellerengines, flew mainly in South Vietnamand performed close air support. Themore powerful “K” model (Stinger) addedtwo jet pods to improve performance andflew interdiction missions in more heav-ily defended areas. Senior Air Forceleaders ranging from the Chief of Staff‘soffice to Seventh Air Force disagreed onthe program’s value, arguing that scarceresources were best applied to convert-ing AC–130s. Secretary of the Air Force(and later Secretary of Defense) HaroldK. Brown continuously asked for studiesregarding cost and force mixture, as didthe Air Staff, before demanding a mixed

fleet of gunships to satisfy cost concerns.Conceived as an interim solution untilthe arrival of AC–130s, the tale of theAC–119 became a microcosm of DefenseDepartment-wide planning, program-ming, and budgeting issues.

Similar to the first section, the book’sfinal section consists of a broad explana-tion of American grand and air powerstrategy in the war’s closing years. HereHead went beyond his focus on theAC–119 to discuss major campaignsincluding Commando Hunt and the twinLinebackers. He showed the AC–119’scontribution and effectiveness as a truckdestroyer while explaining its weaknessesand limitations, concluding that theShadows and Stingers were created priorto the Tet Offensive, a time when victoryseemed possible, but that their ultimatecontribution was covering a strategicretreat. To illuminate the human side ofthe story, Head allowed a few voices fromthe AC–119 community to tell their talesnear the book’s end.

Head wanted to create a historyaccessible to the general reader, and inthe first and last sections of the book, hesucceeded. The middle chapters describ-ing programmatic details are likely tochallenge many readers and may be moreuseful to specialists than many membersof his target audience. Plentiful use of mil-itary terms and abbreviations ensuresthat readers unfamiliar with programdevelopment will flip often to the glossarywhich lists 179 acronyms. Relating theparticular elements of program develop-ment necessitated some re-explanation ofearlier points. Nonetheless, the scholar-ship is excellent, and the contextual notes(all included at the book’s end and orga-nized by chapter) will aid readers unfa-miliar with the Vietnam War. A few minorediting errors appear, including a refer-ence to the late Senator William Proxmireas representing Connecticut rather thanWisconsin. Such errors are few, and thoseseeking an explanation and analysis ofAC–119 development will find Head’sbook useful.

Lt. Col. Steven A. Pomeroy, USAF, DeputyHead, Department of Military StrategicStudies, United States Air Force Academy

Farmans and SIAs: U.S. Army Avia-tion Training and Combat in Italywith Fiorello La Guardia, 1917-1918.By Jack B. Hilliard. Trento, Italy:LoGisma in collaboration with MuseoAeronautico. Illustrations. Photographs.Notes. Appendices. Glossary. Biblio-

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graphy. Pp. 615. € 27,00 Paperback ISBN:88-87621-60-8

When the United States declared waron Germany on April 16, 1917, the UnitedStates Army Air Service was grosslyunprepared for the requirements thatwere immediately placed on it. Therewere only twenty-six pilots in the entireAir Service and only a few military air-fields. If U.S. pilots were to be available tocrew the large number of U.S. aircraft thatwere expected to reach Europe in thespring of 1918, they would have to betaught to fly by America’s allies, includingthe Italians who offered to train 500American flying cadets within twelvemonths.

The first detachment of aviationcadets to be trained in Europe sailed fromNew York on August 13, 1917. All forty-sixhad received their initial training at oneof the aviation ground schools establishedat a number of American universitiesthree years earlier. They were initiallyassigned to the French aviation flightschool at Avord but were soon detachedand assigned to the Italian aviation schoolat Foggia. They were the first of an even-tual total of 457 American aviators to betrained there.

The bulk of the material in this bookconsists of extracts from several diarieskept by some of the members of thisdetachment as well as a number of Ameri-cans who entered the Italian training pro-gram later. The diary entries are allarranged chronologically and divided intoa number of chapters describing: the voy-age across the Atlantic, the transitionfrom England and France to Foggia, life inthe camp, flight training, and the verylimited combat experienced by a few ofthe graduates. Of the 615 pages in thisbook, 576 are devoted to this material.The remaining pages contain brief com-mentary of the history of the Americaninvolvement at Foggia and four appen-dices. Included in the later is an extensivelist of all the combat missions flown by theAmerican graduates of the Italian avia-tion training program. Unfortunately, thebook lacks an index, which severely ham-pers its use for reference.

Another weakness is problematicinclusion of multiple entries for a singledate. This does not make for easy readingnor does it add significantly to the picturepresented by this material. It would havebeen better if the author had selected themost representative entry for each dateand discarded the others. The diaryentries do provide a wealth of material onthe journey to Foggia, however, which wasquite an adventure for those involved.Travel was aboard troopships, which usu-

ally were converted passenger liners; andthe cadets traveled in varying statusdepending on whatever the senior officeraboard decided. The diaries also provide agreat deal of information on the nature ofthe training at Foggia as well as the livingconditions, recreation, and morale of theAmerican cadets.

One final comment: those readerswho are interested in Fiorello LaGuardiashould look elsewhere, as he is mentionedonly briefly in passing.

Thomas Wildenberg, Burtonsville,Maryland

Unconquerable Nation: Knowing OurEnemy, Strengthening Ourselves. ByBrian Michael Jenkins. Santa Monica,Calif.: RAND, 2006. Illustrations. Notes.Appendices. Bibliography. Index. Pp. vii,222. $19.95 Paperback ISBN: 0-8330-3891-5

Brian Jenkins initiated RAND’sresearch on terrorism in 1972. He startsthis book with an assessment of the cur-rent terrorism situation and what consti-tutes the enemy camp, goes on to offer aset of strategic principles to follow incountering terror, and ends with sugges-tions on how to win this war. All the whilehe proposes that the concept of a globalconflict may conflate too many unconnect-ed threats.

The faceless, amorphous nature ofthis threat makes it difficult for struc-tured organizations to deal with by con-ventional methods. It’s like punching apillow when you try to fight a war withouta front. Different types of terrorismrequire different responses. There is no“one size fits all,” and there is also noquick fix. The worst period of terror with-in our own borders (except perhaps thegenocide against the Native Americanpopulation) lasted from Appomattox untilthe Civil Rights legislation of the 1960s.Such movements are often hydra-headed:cut one off and others may spring up torenew the attack.Their mindset is alien tous. Suicide is not a valued part of our cul-ture. We don’t have a religious devotionthat encourages us to die for eternal sal-vation. We don’t share the feral, fanaticappeal of martyrdom.

Though it may appear a matter ofsemantics, it is important to realize thatthere is not a Civil War in Iraq. There isno opponent government; not even a shad-ow government or government-in-exile.There is domestic violence (with somehelp from outside). It is a form of protest

and opposition accompanied by criminali-ty and lawlessness.

Jenkins probably provides moredetail than the general reader needs tounderstand the recommendations that hemakes. He is not a Pollyanna, but hebelieves that “controlling” (even if noteradicating) terrorism is possible andoffers concrete ideas. One intriguingthought is that much of the Islamic Worldis also threatened and that we should usethe dynamic of a shared enemy to betteradvantage.

There are two useful appendices: oneon selected Jihadist attacks since 9/11and the other on failed plots. The readinglist is divided into seventeen categories,which may be useful to some. The text isrelatively short and worth reading bythose concerned with “strengthening our-selves.”

Brig. Gen. Curtis Hooper O’Sullivan, ANG(Ret.), Salida, California

Chronological Encyclopedia of SovietSingle-Engined Fighters 1939-1951.By Herbert Léonard. Translated by AlanMcKay. Paris: Histoire & Collections,2005. Tables. Illustrations. Photographs.Appendices. Pp 208. 82,00 ISBN: 2-915239-60-6

Herbert Léonard, a well knownsinger and entertainment figure inFrance, has produced both a rare andwonderful book on Soviet fighter aircraftwhich were developed, designed anddeployed during the Great Patriotic War(known here in the west as World War II).Léonard is obviously passionate about thesubject, something which becomes readilyapparent not only from the breadth ofresearch that went into this work but alsofrom the layout and contents within. Hehas assembled in one volume what seemsto be every single-engined fighter designconceived in the USSR during this period.

Previous English language texts byauthors such as Vaclav Nemecek andHeinz Nowarra have focused on a broadrange of aircraft types as well as the peri-od covered. Even the seminal Russian lan-guage work by V.B. Shavrov, IstoriyaKonstruktsii Samoletov v SSSR, 1938-1950, deals as much with bombers andtransport aircraft as it does with fighterdesigns.

Léonard has painstakingly amassedthree-view drawings of each aircraft aswell as a number of superbly colored side-view illustrations. However, he alsotapped into the photo-archives of Russian

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aviation historians for some really uniqueand excellent-quality images of the air-craft presented. This, again, is a major dif-ference in comparison to some previouspublications that relied heavily on pho-tographs from the USSR that were editedwith the peculiar airbrushed look all toofamiliar to centerfolds as well as Sovietera photographs—nice but not the realthing.

By and large, the book follows thechronological order of design not only byyear but also by the time of year. Usingthis approach makes perfect sense, sincean aircraft design can be followed andcompared with those of other designOKBs (Opytnoe Konstructorskoe Byuro, orDevelopment Design Bureau).

The preface is important, as it pre-pares the reader with some of the specificsabout this publication: abbreviationsused; notes on the translation; and anexplanation on the use of color-coded starsappearing next to the aircraft to let thereader know at a glance whether thefighter was a front-line craft, prototype, orsimply a design study.

The book’s foreword places into his-torical perspective the economic and polit-ical origins in Germany that led up to theSecond World War. It also touches on theparticular relationship established at theTreaty of Rapallo prior to the warbetween Russia and Germany. The essaycontinues with the status of the aircraftindustry and air forces in the SovietUnion at this pivotal time in its history. Itpoignantly looks at how Stalin recognizedGermany’s ascendancy in this area andhow he realized Russia’s need for parity—if not technologically, then at least bynumbers. For the reader who wants moreon the topic, Von Hardesty’s Red Phoenixis still an excellent source.

Of particular interest in this volumeare the preliminary design studies andprototypes—both unfinished and flying.Concept aircraft are always curiosities asthey anticipate future designs or possibil-ities. Some are obvious dead ends due tolack of speed, payloads, projected arma-ment, or simply poor aerodynamics; whileothers are a window to the future but justa little ahead of their time.

Carl J. Bobrow, Collections Staff, NationalAir and Space Museum

On “Other War”: Lessons from FiveDecades of RAND Counterinsur-gency Research. By Austin Long. SantaMonica, Calif.: RAND National DefenseResearch Institute, 2006. Photographs.

Appendix. Pp. xvii, 101 pages. $20.00Paperback ISBN: 0-8330-3926-1

On “Other War” is a deceptively slen-der monograph generated by RAND forthe Office of the Secretary of Defense.Operations Enduring Freedom (Afghani-stan) and Iraqi Freedom were specificallyin mind when the author tackled fivedecades worth of counterinsurgency(COIN) research conducted by RAND inorder to extrapolate lessons of value. Thismonograph succinctly summarizes lessonslearned again and again in Malaya,Vietnam, Algeria, El Salvador, Nicaragua,and other conflicts in the post-World WarTwo era. In six short chapters, Long con-structs what is essentially a paradigm forthe conduct of COIN. One must under-stand the insurgent’s motivations whileundermining his pyramid of needs(weapons, financing, and a supportive pop-ulation). He also identifies tools for isolat-ing the insurgent from his requirementswhile at the same time developing the con-fidence of the population. Underlying suc-cessful COIN is a population that acceptsthe legitimacy of its government and ismade secure from exploitation and retalia-tion. The population in COIN is the centerof gravity. Long concludes that the metricfor success in this arena is not the popula-tion’s attitude but its actions.

This monograph addresses other keyareas that must be embraced by an effec-tive counterinsurgency. Areas of focus are:

Unity of effort and command: the variousagencies involved in COIN cannot oper-ate as autonomous entities; they mustbe synergistic and ultimately answer toone “master.” Long sees the US ambas-sador as the most logical person incharge (in a sense like the “countryteams” that serve under all ambas-sadors), and not the combatant com-mander. Consequently, there should be astructural hierarchy of effort that inte-grates all agencies (Long suggests struc-turing an integrated team effort fromthe village/city neighborhood level up toa “National Reconstruction Team” at theambassadorial level).

Intelligence: all intelligence must be inte-grated and made available to the effortand not “stove piped” for sole use by therespective intelligence agencies.

Border control: the experiences in bothIraq and Afghanistan have demonstrat-ed the need for effective control of move-ment across international borders.

COIN metrics to measure mission success:“body counting” in the Vietnam War wasa useless metric. In COIN the measure-ments may come from subtle indicatorssuch as voluntary flow of intelligence

from a cooperative population.Identification of the need to provide insur-

gents with an alternative to continuedstruggle: One important tool is anamnesty and reward program to weaninsurgents away.

Pacification: the COIN effort must inte-grate security with development.

Lt. Gen. Petraeus, the recently ap-pointed commander of forces in Iraq, is aserious student of COIN. As the command-ing general of the 101st Airborne Division,he employed, with some success, COINtechniques in northern Iraq in 2003-4. Henow intends to turn the war in Iraq aroundby employing nation-wide the lessons ofCOIN. It is of great importance that thelessons summarized in this monograph beincorporated in pre-deployment training sothat the actions of US combatants do notbecome counter-productive to the overalleffort (witness the lasting impact of the2003-4 Abu Ghraib Prison abuses).

In closing, Long makes an interestingobservation: “The United States, by virtueof its massive nuclear and conventionalcapability, has driven almost all potentialopponents to embrace terrorism andinsurgency as their only potentially viabletheory of victory.” Consequently, conven-tional forces, if they are to be effective incurrent and future conflict, need to betterunderstand and employ the lessonsencapsulated in this book.

John L. Cirafici, Col. USAF (Ret.), MilfordDelaware

Phantom Reflections: The Educationof an American Fighter Pilot in Viet-nam. By Mike McCarthy. Westport, Ct.and London: Praeger Security Interna-tional, 2007. Photographs. Index. Pp. xiv,176. $44.95 ISBN: 0-275-99327-2

At first glance, this volume mayappear to be just one more Vietnam Warretrospective among many other similartomes already in existence. However,there are a few unique facets to Colonel(retired) Mike McCarthy’s action-filledaccount that make this a welcome addi-tion to any aviation buff’s bookshelf.

McCarthy, a veteran of 124 combatmissions over Vietnam and Laos (now anArizona State University professor), hasdone an excellent job at fulfilling the goalstated early in his introduction: “…toshow what it felt like” to fly an F–4Phantom II jet in combat. He traces hisjourney from flight school to Vietnam andbeyond, highlighting key aspects of air-to-

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air and air-to-ground operations, as wellas providing a glimpse into the mindset ofa young American fighter pilot. Themajority of the text revolves around hisone-year assignment as a member of thefamous 8th Tactical Fighter Wing, UbonRoyal Thai Air Base, Thailand, from 1967to 1968, and his personal journey frompeacetime airman to combat veteran. Thememoir includes many humorous andserious accounts of what life was like dur-ing this turbulent yet transformationalperiod in Air Force history. Mission tac-tics, procedures, and hazards are accu-rately described in detail. What makesthis account stand out from otherVietnam “there I was…”-type memoirs, isits jargon-free, easy-to-understand expla-nations of air combat techniques, strate-gies, and formations. For example, theauthor uses a three-dimensional model todescribe wingman and flight lead maneu-vers that enable the reader to grasp theseconcepts without the need for a sketchpad. Likewise, when the author describeshis fear at being assigned “number four”in a bombing run over Hanoi, he thentakes the time to explain that the phraserefers to the trailing aircraft in a flight offour aircraft—statistically, the aircraftthat usually receives the most battle dam-age. One gets the impression that thisbook was not primarily written for fellowair warriors, but rather for readers with-out a military or flying background.

There is a welcome absence of combatglamorization that gives the book an auraof integrity. Pre-mission feelings of fearand anxiety are accurately portrayed, andthe gripping narrative includes the re-telling of a close call with an enemy sur-face-to-air missile that exploded meremeters away from McCarthy’s aircraft.There is also an interesting description ofthe combat rescue of F–100 driver andfuture Voyager pilot Dick Rutan, andMcCarthy’s own admissions of relation-ship troubles between loved ones andfamily members that often occur duringlong deployments.

Despite the smooth text, there aresome distractions that take away from thebook’s potential: the rather hefty price tagfor such a small volume is one. While theauthor does include 19 original pho-tographs from his personal collection, hedid not provide maps or references of anykind. The noticeable map void provestroublesome when trying to visualize loca-tions of mentioned airbases and enemytargets. Likewise, I would have expected abook written by a university professor tohave included footnotes and a simple listof references and sources, if not a bibliog-raphy. Nevertheless, while the book maynot meet the scholarly level useful for his-

torians, it is addictively engrossing and amust read for anyone interested in aclose-up view of the Vietnam air war. MikeMcCarthy is completely successful inattaining his goal of showing us all “whatit was like.”

Lt. Col. Stephen T. Ziadie, USAF, 341stSpace Wing, Malmstrom AFB, Montana

A Carrier at War. By Richard F. Miller.Dulles, Va.: Potomac Books, 2007. Map.Photographs. Index. Pp. xii, 243. $17.95paperback. ISBN: 1-59797-047-6

Inasmuch as I’d seen very little aboutthe Navy’s role in Iraqi Freedom, I wasanxious to see what this book had to offerto fill the void. It wasn’t exactly what Ihoped for. The author didn’t get aboardthe ship (USS Kittyhawk, CV 63) untilpage 59, and the first combat flight wasn’tlaunched from the carrier until page 219.Nonetheless, the work is enlightening insome respects and even entertaining.However, I’ve learned more about the mis-sions and capabilities of carriers from myfavorite television show, “JAG.”

I’ve read a considerable number ofstories by other embedded reporters, butthis one varies both in the locale of thereporting and the background of thereporter. Miller is a 51-year-old with a lawdegree and a 25-year career in investmentbanking who started a second vocation asan historian specializing in the socialaspects of our Civil War. Family connec-tions expedited getting credentials as acorrespondent for Talk Radio NewsService.

During the two weeks he spent on the“Shitty Kitty,” he describes how the sus-pense builds up to the moment of truthwhen the F/A–18 Hornets and F–14Tomcats are catapulted with live muni-tions toward living targets. The approachhe used is to cover, in turn, each functionand activity aboard ship and show howeach contributed to the total effort. Hespent time in the brig, sick bay, chaplains’office, wardroom, enlisted mess, andsmoking sponsors. From these contacts,he drew conclusions about the feelings ona number of issues such as going to warand racial integration. He touched on“Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” but not in anydepth. I’m not sure he is aware of whatthe Universal Code of Military Justice(UCMJ) says about sodomy. He may knowless about with it takes to change a lawthat is strongly supported by manyAmericans.

Miller was not alone among the

embedded reporters in not having hadmilitary service (their ranks are thin-ning); but, in his case, this lack was a fac-tor leading him to accept a potentiallyhazardous assignment. He had evadedthe draft during Vietnam and, rather thantaking pride in the acumen and affluencethat allowed him to beat the system, feltsome shame in having others suffer in hisstead. His strong religious convictionsmay have contributed to this feeling ofguilt.

The one map included doesn’t serveany particular purpose. The numerousphotographs are helpful, but I would haveappreciated more photos of the facilitiesabout which he wrote. I was hoping toupdate what I leaned about carrier opera-tions from the Naval War College 40 yearsago, but that will have to wait for anotherbook. This one does, however, give a goodpicture of life on a carrier today.

Brig. Gen. Curtis Hooper O’Sullivan, ANG(Ret.), Salida, California

Flight from Fear [A Novel]. By SarahByrn Rickman. Santa Fe, N.M.: Disc-UsBooks, 1996. Pp. 241. $16.50 PaperbackISBN: 1-58444-273-5 andThe Originals: The Women’s Auxil-iary Ferrying Squadron in World WarII. By Sarah Byrn Rickman. Santa Fe,N.M.: Disc-Us Books, 2001. Glossary.Bibliography. Index. Pp. 413. $24.95Paperback ISBN: 1-58444-264-6

It isn’t everyday that an author whowrites a fictionalized account of an actualevent so piques the interest of her readersthat they can turn to another book writ-ten by the same author to learn moreabout the trials and tribulations of thefirst book’s heroines. Sarah Byrn Rickmanhas managed to pull off this feat with aWorld War II novel, Flight from Fear. Thecentral character is Lacy Stearns whosepilot-husband is killed while flying hisB–24 in England. Lacy, in a selfless act oflove for her husband and her country,makes the courageous decision to earnher pilot’s wings so that she “can fly in herhusband’s place.”

Once Lacy earns those wings she isaccepted into Jackie Cochran’s WomenAirforce Service Pilots (WASP) program.From there Rickman successfully weavesthe fictionalized story of Lacy and her fly-ing cohorts with true accounts of whathappened to many of the WASPs whoserved during World War II. Much of thisbook relates the determination that ittook for these young women to earn pilots’

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licenses at a time when teaching a womanto fly was considered a waste of a man’stime. Thankfully, many of these pioneer-ing women crossed paths with men whowere not only open-minded enough toteach a woman to fly but also realized thatour country would need more pilots—evenif some of them happened to be wearingdresses.

While Flight from Fear starts outwith a predictable storyline, readers aresoon surprised at the turn of severalheartbreaking events and will find them-selves stealing a few minutes here andthere during their busy day to see justwhat will happen with Lacy and her newfriends. Rickman even goes so far as tomatch some of her fictional characters’storylines with the family backgrounds ofactual WASPs. Many of the women flyerscross paths in the storyline with JackieCochran, Nancy Love, and Betty Gillies.

While the emphasis in Flight is onthe WASPs, Rickman’s follow-up book,The Originals, tells the story of NancyLove and the Women’s Auxiliary FerryingSquadron (WAFS). Love started this pro-gram with the encouragement of theaccomplished Brig. Gen. William Tunnerwho liked to say while referring to hisearly flying days, “We didn’t fly planes inthose days; we rode them.” Since it waseasier to get fuel for an airplane than fora car, Nancy, while working at a civilianpost with the Army Transport Command(ATC) in Baltimore, flew the sixty milesfrom Washington to Baltimore daily inher own plane. A chance meeting at theproverbial water cooler between Nancy’shusband, Bob Love, and Tunner, who wasscouring the country for skilled pilots,would set in motion the creation ofNancy’s WAFS.

Though many books have been writ-ten about the WASPs, this is a book thatfinally focuses on the 29 qualifyingwomen that Nancy Love had recruited forher WAF program. They were forever tobe known as “the Originals,” because theywere flying before Cochran’s Women’sFlying Training Detachment (WFTD) pro-gram was airborne. This book delvesdeeply into each separate program as noother has. While previous books scratchedjust below the surface of the relationshipbetween Love and Cochran, this one does-n’t make the reader read between thelines. Rickman writes of the competitionand machinations of the battles that wenton behind the scenes on the emerging andmerging of both Nancy’s and Jackie’s pro-grams. It didn’t hurt Cochran’s positionthat, through the influence of her million-aire husband, she was able to gain theears of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt.

Excerpts taken from the interviews,

letters, and diaries of several “Originals”give the reader a sense of the intensity ofthese events as though they happenedyesterday instead of decades ago.Rickman takes the reader along on somewild rides with the WAFS women whogradually worked their way up flying fiftydifferent types of airplanes, from trainersto P–47s, P–51s, and P–38s. She coversthe gut-wrenching last minute abort ofLove’s and Gillies’ potential history-mak-ing flight as the first women to fly a B–17“across the pond.” These stories alongwith the merging of the two programs intothe WASP program to their inevitable dis-banding while the war was still on arecovered in this volume.

Also of note are accounts over theyears of WASPs trying to gain militaryrecognition for their war efforts, only to befoiled. It was not until the mid 1970swhen the ten women who began flighttraining for the U.S. Air Force were her-alded in a Pentagon press release as “thefirst women military pilots” that thingsreally started flying. WASP legislationwas introduced thanks to the help ofBarry Goldwater, who also happened to beone WASP’s instrument instructor duringthe war; Tunner, who came out of retire-ment; and Hap Arnold’s son, Bruce. In alast ditch effort, Arnold inserted a copy ofa WASP’s service discharge. When onecongressman compared it to his ownWorld War II discharge and realized theywere identical, he and several otherschanged their votes in favor of the act.

Nancy Love didn’t live long enough tosee her “girls” get their recognition. Whenshe died at age sixty-two, she left behind abox she had kept for more than thirtyyears. Inside was a handwritten list of thewomen pilots along with clippings andphotographs of those who had died whileunder her command. Just as the veteransof World War II ranks are thinning, so tooare theirs; and it’s about time these WAFSget the recognition they deserve. Just asso many women pilots delivered desper-ately needed planes to their destinations,Sarah Rickman delivers this one for them.

Janet Baltas, Docent, Udvar-Hazy Center,National Air and Space Museum

Marauder: Memoir of a B–26 Pilot inEurope in World War II. By Louis S.Rehr with Carleton R. Rehr. Jefferson,N.C.: McFarland, 2004. Photographs.Maps. Appendices. Index. Pp. 224. $39.95ISBN: 978-0-7864-1664-6

Louis Rehr’s autobiography of his

World War II service as a B–26 pilot is awell written book from a knowledgeableveteran. It focuses on the period from hisarrival in England with his B–26 in July1944 until his return to the U.S. in June1945.

Rehr’s flying experience makes himan expert in the B–26 and its use to attacktargets in France and Germany after D-Day, June 6, 1944. Rehr was a B–26instructor pilot from February 1943 untilhe was sent to England in 1944. Becauseof his experience in the bomber, he oftentrained newer pilots and crewmen at hisbases in England and France.

In addition to training others, Rehrflew 60 combat missions, leading otheraircraft in 23 of them. He and his bom-bardier became very proficient at blowingup bridges to hinder German forces, eventhough his longer bombing runs forbridges placed him, his crew, and thosefollowing him in greater danger of attackfrom air and ground defenses.

Rehr does not hide the perils or hisemotions. He discusses the deaths andinjuries that resulted from training acci-dents, equipment malfunctions, and com-bat. He explains the perspective of a vet-eran pilot who has watched his peers dieor return home, while green replacementsfill the ranks. He expresses his dislike ofthe German pilots who continued to resistand fight long after Germany had clearlylost the war. Rehr’s insightful personalcomments about combat are punctuatedby terrific photographs.

This book has great black and whitepictures, from the cover shot of a B–26 ona bomb un with explosions in the back-ground, to the last photo of the book withRehr and his crew in front of a B–26.Included are shots of B–26s in formation,terrific pictures of bridges being hit bybombs, and other photos of bomb damage.There are many photos of the crews andair bases, which illustrate their living con-ditions during the war. Some of the mostmoving combat photos show a B–26 beinghit by flak and a group of six B–26s underattack by a German Me 262 jet.

In contrast to the tales and photos ofwar, Rehr adds information about his per-sonal experiences in Europe during peace-time. He visited Europe in 1938 and wasable to contrast his vacation memorieswith the ruined cities he visited duringand after the war. Before and during thewar he visited London and Paris.After thewar was over, Rehr spent May-June 1945stationed in Germany as part of the forcesdisarming the defeated enemy. While sta-tioned in southern Germany, he was ableto visit that area and some of Italy.

After the war, Rehr went to collegeand became a farmer in Florida. An

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appendix to the book by Lou Rehr’s wife,Carleton, tells about Lou and seven of hisfellow Marauder veterans and what theydid after the war.

The information about the survivorshelps put their lives in perspective, but italso highlights a weakness in the book.This biography is too short.The great pho-tographs and well-written stories left mewanting to know even more about B–26bombers and their crews. I recommendthis book to anyone interested in WorldWar II or in air campaigns. But, bewarned that you may find yourself seek-ing to learn more about this aircraft.

Major Herman Reinhold, USAF, Admini-strative Law Attorney

Red Flag: Air Combat for the 21stCentury. By Tyson V. Rininger. St. Paul,Minn.: Zenith Press, 2006. Maps. Photo-graphs. Appendix. Index. Pp. 128. $19.95ISBN: 0-7603-2530-8.

Tyson Rininger promises to takereaders “behind the scenes of the biggest,most complex, high-tech military exerciseconducted anywhere in the world.” Thebook largely delivers on that promise. Itswell-organized chapters logically stepthrough the history of Nellis AFB, the ori-gins of Red Flag, the Red and Blue Teams,and the future of the exercise.

It is obvious that Red Flag cadre andexercise veterans provided considerablesupport to the author. The book is filledwith quotes and stories from aircrew whoprovide an insider’s view of Red Flag.

The best part of the book is the spec-tacular collection of photographs. Rinin-ger is a top photographer for the Inter-national Council of Airshows whose pho-tographs have graced the covers ofAirshows magazine and World AirshowNews. His collection of glossy photographswill make all readers, including thosewith just a casual interest in aviation,want to “strap in tight, light it up, andtake to the skies.”

At times, however, the author’s over-zealous quest to excite readers borders onexaggeration. For example, the bookbegins, “Red Flag. Two words that canmake or break an air force fighter pilot.”Really? Certainly, Red Flag provides somefabulous training, but the two-week exer-cise hardly makes or breaks an individ-ual’s aviation career. Moreover, Red Flag’straining mandate goes beyond simplypreparing fighter pilots for aerial combat.The real value of Red Flag lies in the inte-gration of various platforms—bombers,

unmanned aerial vehicles, tankers, etc.Because the book was published in

2006, it does not contain the most up-to-date Red Flag developments and includessome out-of-date information. In Feb-ruary 2007, the F–22 Raptor made arecord-setting exercise debut, and theF–117A Nighthawk flew its last sched-uled Red Flag. The book also discussesonly briefly Red Flag Alaska. One photo-graph identifies General John Jumper asthe USAF Chief of Staff, while a laterquote is from General T. Michael Mosely,the current Chief.

Sidebars that describe military air-craft are also a slight disappointment.These provide only a cursory descriptionof each aircraft’s history, mission, andcapabilities. Moreover, the appendix isslightly repetitive as it repeats informa-tion contained in the sidebars.

Additionally, the book uncriticallyparrot’s industry claims regarding thefuture effectiveness of the F–22 andF–35. For example, “The F–22A will havebetter reliability and maintainabilitythan any fighter aircraft in history. …Increased F–22A reliability and main-tainability pays off in less manpower torepair and maintain.” The Raptor is asuperb aircraft, but reliability and main-tenance advantages over legacy aircrafthave yet to materialize. In fact, theRaptor has underperformed in this area.

Lastly, the book devotes too muchtext describing mundane organizationalactivities at Nellis. In a book focused onRed Flag, does the reader really need toknow that the 99th Air Base Wing is sep-arated into three groups which provide a“wide array of services including trans-portation, supply, morale, welfare, recre-ation and services, contracting, civil engi-neering, security police, mission support,and communication? Or that the wing isresponsible for the operation of a new114-bed hospital? The space would be putto better use if it were devoted to includ-ing more of Rininger’s amazing photogra-phy.

The author correctly notes, “Withouta doubt, it is the Red Team that makesthe Red Flag experience so successful.”With that in mind, Rininger could havespent more time detailing how the newAggressor squadron realistically repli-cates current threats. Armed with the lat-est intelligence, Aggressors go waybeyond simple replication of old Soviettactics.

On a side note, readers interested inlearning more about the celebrated RedBaron report, a driving factor in the cre-ation of Red Flag, should obtain a copy ofthe Fall 2005 (vol. 52, no. 3) edition of AirPower History. In “The Red Baron Re-

ports: What They Really Said,” WilliamSayers attacks some of the myths sur-rounding the report.

Lt. Col. Lawrence Spinetta, USAF, 1stFighter Wing Chief of Safety

The Last of a Breed. By Errol D.Severe. Eureka Springs, Ark.: LighthouseProductions, 1997. Illustrations. Photo-graphs. Bibliography. Pp. 366. $39.95ISBN: 0-9656957-0-0

Many books have been written aboutour military in various wars. Countlesspersonal accounts and unit histories existof the air war over Europe and thePacific, Korea, and Vietnam. However,The Last of a Breed is a unique book.Although it targets a specific group ofmen, it encompasses not one war nor oneunit or squadron. Rather, it covers an erawhen the Aviation Cadet program wasresponsible for the training of almost allof the rated aircrew officers in the SignalCorps, Air Service, Army Air Corps,United States Army Air Forces, and theUnited States Air Force. For well overforty years, the program provided theService with its new rated officers. Butthese are the men who went to warthroughout most of the conflicts that tookplace in the Twentieth Century, so theimpact of the Aviation Cadet programwas truly far reaching.

Severe describes the training of themen who would defend our nation in theskies from the program’s inception in1917 through the period of the most vig-orous air combat in our history. He welldescribes the rigorous program that wasso unique and positive that it not onlytrained great flyers but also producedsome of the greatest men of our country.During this time, the backbone of our AirForce was formed by these young menwho were, in a very short time, turnedinto what were some of the finest pilotswho have ever lived. However, one alsoneeds to understand that Cadet programtrained not only pilots, but the naviga-tors, observers, and bombardiers whomade up the crews of the thousands ofbombers and transports who served inWorld War II and much of the Cold War.

Severe’s book is an excellent historicalaccount of the program. But, perhaps evenmore importantly, he tells numerous per-sonal stories reflecting on the characterand greatness of the Aviation Cadet. Thebook provides a panorama of experiences,events,and history.There is hardly a Cadetalive who will not agree that this program

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is what made him who he is today. I realizethat there are as many different stories asthere are Cadets to tell them, so this bookonly scratches the surface. But what it doesis allow the old Aviation Cadet to go back toa time in his life when he was in his earlytwenties and going through Hell to wearthose wings of silver over his left pocket. Toall of my fellow Cadets out there, put onyour parachute, climb into the cockpit ofthat Air Force trainer, fasten your seatbelt,start the engine(s), and get ready to go intothe “Wild Blue Yonder.” again. For otherreaders who just want to know what thishuge program was like and what it took toget through it, this is definitely the book toread.

Lt. Col. Al Hopkins, USAF (Ret.),Class 55-J, NASM Docent

LeMay: A Biography. By Barrett Till-man. New York: Palgrave Macmillan Press,2007. Photographs. Notes. Index. Pp. 192.$21.95. ISBN-13: 978-4039-7135-7

This compact biography of LeMaycovers his professional life with almost noreferences to his personal background orfamily. There are mentions of his wife,daughter, brothers, sisters, mother, andfather; but that is not a part of LeMay’slife Tillman sets out to record. Rather heuses these few pages to define LeMay asthe military man and leader that he was.

In telling LeMay’s story, Tillmandraws heavily—almost too heavily—on asmall number of references. There are 36references to LeMay’s autobiographywhich he wrote with MacKinlay Kantorand at least nine references to Coffey’sIron Eagle. Nothing is used from JudgeNutter’s The Possum and the Eagle.

Tillman’s book is deserving of widecirculation if only to show people what anoutstanding leader LeMay grew to be.Tillman works to erase the dour curmud-geon image left by critics. In the “Debrief”chapter at the end of the book, a fewquotes are given from LeMay’s contempo-raries. General Norstad called him an“operator”: he was all about results. Thatis exactly the word we who served underhim used in referring to him. In the onlyB–29 combat mission Washington allowedhim to fly, he flew with Colonel IraCornett’s crew to Anshan, Manchuria.Theplane took some flak hits and some crewmembers were slightly injured. LeMaycrawled through the tunnel to the back ofthe ship and provided first aid. LeMaywas not a planner or a philosopher or astrategist. He was an “operator.” More-

over, he was skilled at every positionneeded to fly a bomber: pilot, navigator,bombardier, engineer, and possibly evenradio operator.

In a book Air Leadership whichrecords the proceedings of an Air Forceconference on the subject, Allan R. Millettnoted: “The people, particularly in peace-time, who have had the greatest impactupon their services are those who havehad time, a great deal of power and a sub-stantial amount of vision. I don’t think itis accidental that in the history of theUSAF, for example, people like HapArnold and Curtis LeMay stand out asstrong leaders, because each had all threeof those ingredients.”

Tillman takes us through LeMay’scareer in combat with the Eighth AirForce in Europe, the XXth BomberCommand in the CBI, and the XXIstBomber Command in the Marianas. Hisperiod as head of Strategic Air Com-mand—when he took a force that wasalmost a negative factor and transformedit into the most formidable war weapon inthe world at the time—is covered, thoughnot in the depth I would have liked. Thereis a somewhat sour taste to the part onLeMay’s tour in Washington. For example,Tillman did not mention how LeMaymust have felt about reporting toMcNamara as Secretary of Defense, whenin India, McNamara served under LeMayas an undistinguished lieutenant colonelStatistical Control Officer.

Everyone whose life was touched—orcommanded—by LeMay, has an anecdoteby which to remember him. Mine tookplace in Hsinching, China, when prepara-tions were being made for the Anshanmission.The afternoon before the mission,I came bursting out of a door to the brief-ing room and there, sitting in a jeep, wasLeMay firing up his pipe. I was a punycaptain, intelligence officer, scared spit-less at the sight of the general. What todo? Salute before you make another move.This was done. Puttering with his pipe,LeMay returned the salute—with his lefthand.

William A. Rooney, Group IntelligenceOfficer, Twentieth Air Force, World War II

Reflections of a Technocrat: Mana-ging Defense, Air, and Space Pro-grams during the Cold War. By Dr.John McLucas, with Kenneth Alnwickand Lawrence Benson. Maxwell AFB,Ala.: Air University Press, 2006. Photo-graphs. Notes. Appendices. Glossary.

Bibliography. Pp. xxvi, 367. PaperbackISBN: 1-58566-156-2

This book combines autobiography,biography, personal memoir, and historyof aerospace programs in an importantperiod of history. John McLucas, wellknown manager and leader of militaryand industrial enterprises in aerospace,provided the essential framework for theautobiographical and historical elementsof the book. The collaboration of retiredColonel Ken Alnwick and Larry Benson,both card-carrying historians, produced asolid work. Though packed with dates,events, people, battles, companies, deci-sions, and programs, it is quite readablefor anyone interested in the developmentsand issues in which McLucas wasinvolved. It should also interest studentsof management and political science forthe insights it gives into the personalitiesand practices of the movers and shakersin this business.

The exposition seems, to one whoknew him, typically McLucasian. It ismatter-of-fact, but many gems of informa-tion and flashes of a dry, often puckish,wit enliven it. No doubt many readers,though they knew him well, will still havesome “I didn’t know that!” moments. Thefinal chapter was written after McLucas’sdeath, based on his draft material andfurther research by his co-authors.

Five major subject areas are covered:personal history, industry work, Air Forceservice, directorship of the NationalReconnaissance Office (NRO), and othergovernment service.

McLucas’s brief personal family his-tory emphasizes the modesty of his cir-cumstances as a child and the difficultiescaused by the early death of his fatherand separation from his mother. Childrenof the Great Depression will recognize afamiliar pattern of a family rallyingaround its more needy members and pro-viding the support and succor needed forthem to get on with life in tough times.Young John got that support, workedhard, went to good schools and colleges,and got on with a fulfilling life. On his wayto his career as a technocrat, he served asa Navy radar officer at Okinawa. Thissurely qualifies McLucas for TomBrokaw’s Greatest Generation. He did notdwell on his combat experience, but itsmemory must have been with him whenhe was making decisions about combatsystems other people would take to war.

Work in industry provided bookendsfor McLucas’s long tenure in government.His post-war graduate education lead to ajob with a Pennsylvania startup company.While still in his thirties, he became pres-ident of HRB Singer. Here he showed the

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combination of technical understanding,business acumen, management skills,and entrepreneurial spirit that charac-terized his professional life. In 1977, afterlong service in government, he returnedto industry and consulting for the rest ofhis career. Rising to the presidency ofComsat World Systems, he became aleader in world telecommunications anda leading advocate of international coop-eration in space and technical informa-tion interchange. After formal retirementat age sixty-five, he was an active consul-tant with government and industry andpursued his entrepreneurial bent withseveral startup companies.

Air Force service was high onMcLucas’s list of accomplishments. Thismaterial, together with that on the NRO,is the heart of the book. He provides acompact history of Air Force managementduring the critical period 1969-1975. Ofparticular interest is his description ofthe synergistic relationship between theSecretary, Dr. Robert Seamans, and him-self while he was Under Secretary andDirector of the NRO. The two were quitedifferent in style and background, buttheir compatibility and unity of purposemade them a great management team.As a staff assistant, I sat in on many ofthe meetings and deliberations of thisteam and regard that two-year course inexecutive management as superior toanything one could have obtained atHarvard or Wharton!

In describing his Air Force service,McLucas names many superb tech-nocrats who served in the Pentagon dur-ing his tenure: Dave Packard, JohnFoster, Bill Perry, Al Flax, and JimSchlesinger are a few examples of theeye-watering collection of technical andmanagerial talent in DoD during thisperiod.

McLucas characterized his manage-ment style as “just a bit more easygoing.”He favored “management by walkingaround” – gathering a strong professionalstaff and using them skillfully. He solicit-ed a wide range of inputs; listened care-fully; and, through discussions, debate,

compromise, and elimination, winnowedout the best ideas and reached a decision.This approach left no bruised egos andassured the team would be available forthe next problem.

When describing interactions of DoDand other government people, McLucaspulls no punches. Readers get insiderinsights into high-level conflicts, many ofwhich arose out of the conduct of theVietnam War and the drawdown of U.S.forces. He, himself, wrestled with the warcommitment, wanting it to end while atthe same time feeling that the Air Force,differently equipped and trained, couldhave been more decisive. He believed inair power’s role in defeating large-scaleground offensives but also believed thatVietnamization was doomed. The arcanerules of engagement (ROE) for operationsin southern Laos was another area thatsubstantially bothered him.

McLucas took great interest in AirForce personnel matters, particularlyrace relations and women’s career oppor-tunities. He didn’t just talk the talk. Apicture in the book shows him participat-ing in a race relations class. After hebecame Secretary of the Air Force,McLucas played a leading role in theadmission of women to pilot training andto the Air Force Academy.

As Director of the NRO, McLucasfound a perfect fit with his managementbackground and DoD experience. A thattime, the NRO directorship went with theterritory of the Under Secretary of the AirForce. Thus, he was dual-hatted in 1969-1973 and had three bosses: the Air ForceSecretary, Secretary of Defense, and theDirector of Central Intelligence. Thiscould have been a managerial mess, butMcLucas handled it with great skill. Hefelt his NRO tenure was a kind of goldenage due to the combination of a smoothrunning operation, technical success,exceptional people, minimal bureaucraticinterference, adequate funding, minimalcongressional interference, and the satis-faction of making a great contribution tonational security. His description of theworking relations among Defense, Air

Force, CIA, and NRO is insightful andcomplementary, although he possiblyunderstates some of the sharp elbowingthat went on in the trenches. This compe-tition was probably beneficial, and ulti-mately everyone involved in the NROhad the overall success of the programuppermost in mind.

As he was leaving the Air Force, hewas persuaded by President Ford to runthe troubled Federal Aviation Adminis-tration. During his two years there hemanaged problems with airport safety,terrorism, jet noise, air traffic controllerlabor issues, and cockpit manning dis-putes with his customary equanimitybefore leaving the government sector.

I was surprised by a few omissions inthe text. Given McLucas’s interest inwomen’s career development, the bookfails to note Professor Sheila Widnall’sservice as Secretary of the Air Force. Ialso would have expected more than apassing reference to the establishment ofthe Air Force Space Command. Further,while the bibliography is good, some ref-erences may be difficult to access for allbut the most dedicated researchers. Thisdifficulty is, in part, an artifact of thesecretive origin of the NRO. Finally, thebook might be too full of technical, man-agerial and political details to appeal tothe general reader and is probably notthe book to take on vacation for readingon the beach.

Minor criticisms aside, the book iswell written and edited. It reads easily, atleast for a reader who generally knowsthe territory. Many readers will keep it athand as a reference on Air Force history.In my case, it is also a reminder of a val-ued colleague, boss, and friend—a manwho personified the sentiment of that oldArmy recruiting slogan: Be all that youcan be.

Brig. Gen. William Shields, USAF (Ret.),Tucson, Arizona

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Gargus, John. The Son Tay Raid: American POWsin Vietnam Were Not Forgotten. College Station:Texas A&M University Press, 2007. Maps. Illus-trations. Photographs. Notes. Appendices. Glossary.Bibliography. Index. Pp. xv, 332. $29.95 ISBN: 1-58544-622-X

Graff, Cory. P–47 Thunderbolt at War. [The At WarSeries] St. Paul, Minn.: MBI Publishing, 2007[Zenith Press]. Photographs. Appendix Bibliogra-phy. Index. Pp. 128. $19.95 Paperback ISBN: 0-7603-2948-1

Gray, Stephen R. Rampant Raider: An A–4Skyhawk Pilot in Vietnam. Annapolis, Md.: NavalInstitute Press, 2007. Maps. Photographs. Index.Pp. ix, 284. $32.50 ISBN: 1-59114-342-0

Malloney, Sean M. Learning to Love the Bomb:Canada’s Nuclear Weapons during the Cold War.Washington, D.C.: Potomac Books, 2007. Maps.Tables. Diagrams. Illustrations. Photographs.Notes. Appendices. Glossary. Bibliography. Index.Pp. xxv, 471. $29.95 ISBN: 1-57488-616-0

Michaelson, Ky. Rocketman: My Rocket-PropelledLife and High-Octane Creations. St. Paul, Minn.:MBI Publishing, 2007 [Motorbooks]. Photographs.Appendices. Pp. 240. $27.95 ISBN: 0-7603-3143-9

Miller, Roger G. Billy Mitchell: Evangelist of AirPower. [Shapers of America.] Stockton, N.J. OTTNPublishing, 2007. Maps. Illustrations. Photographs.Notes. Appendices. Glossary. Bibliography. Index.Pp. 152. $25.95 Paperback ISBN: 1-59556-025-4


Anderson, David L. and John Ernst, Eds. The Warthat Never Ends: New Perspectives on the VietnamWar. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky,2007. Map. Photographs. Notes. Index. Pp. vii, 368.$35.00 ISBN: 0-8131-2473-5

Atkinson, Rick. The Day of Battle: The War in Sicilyand Italy, 1943-1944. [Volume 2: The LiberationTrilogy] New York: Henry Holt and Co., 2007. Map.Notes. Glossary. Bibliography. Index. Pp. $35.00Paperback ISBN: 0-8050-6289-2

Bourque, Stephen A. and John W. Burdan III. TheRoad to Safwan: The 1st Squadron, 4th Cavalry inthe 1991 Persian Gulf War. Denton: University ofNorth Texas Press, 2007. Maps. Illustrations. Pho-tographs. Notes. Appendices. Glossary. Bibliogra-phy. Index. Pp. 312. $27.95 ISBN: 1-57441-232-1

Call, Steve. Danger Close: Tactical Air Controllersin Afghanistan and Iraq. College Station: TexasA&M University Press, 2007. Maps. Photographs.Appendix. Glossary. Index. Pp. xvii, 250. $29.95ISBN: 1-58544-624-7

Cotter, Jarrod. The Battle of Britain MemorialFlight, 50 Years of Flying. Pen & Sword, 20007.Appendices. Bibliography. Index. Pp.240. $60.00ISBN: 1-84415-566-8

Franks, Norman, Hal Giblin and Nigel McCrery.Under the Guns of the Red Baron: The CompleteRecord of Von Richthofen’s Victories and VictimsFully Illustrated. London: Grubb Street, 2007.Diagrams. Illustrations. Photographs. Glossary.Index. Pp. 222. L12.99 Paperback ISBN: 1-904943-97-7

PROSPECTIVE REVIEWERS

Anyone who believes he or she is qualified to substantively assess one of the new books listedabove is invited to apply for a gratis copy of the book. The prospective reviewer should contact:

Col. Scott A. Willey, USAF (Ret.)3704 Brices Ford Ct.Fairfax, VA 22033Tel. (703) 620-4139e-mail: [email protected]

* Already under review.

Books Received


2008April 17-20

The Society for Military History (SMH) will hold itsannual conference in Ogden, Utah. The theme is, “TheMilitary and Frontiers,” with papers exploring the mili-tary’s relationship to geographic, technological, social,and political boundaries. Contact:www.weber.edu/History/WhatsHappening/SMH2008.html

May 14-18The Council on America’s Military Past (CAMP) will holdits annual conference in Salt Lake City, Utah. The con-ference will focus on the American West. Contact:Dale Floyd at: [email protected]

The Military Classics Seminar meets on the thirdTuesday of each month at Ft. Myer, Virginia, for dinnerand a book review and discussion. For details, contactDr. Ed Raines: [email protected]

The MCS schedule for 2008 is:

March 18, 2008 Dual: MacDonald, Charles. The Battleof the Huertgen Forest. Boston: Lippincott, 1963 (SouthMountain Press 1986); Rush, Robert S. Hell in theHuertgen Forest: The Ordeal and Triumph of anAmerican Infantry Regiment (Modern War Studies).

Lawrence, Kan.: University Press of Kansas, 2001.Speaker: Dianne L. Smith, Defense Intelligence Agency

April 15, 2008 Janowitz, Morris. The ProfessionalSoldier: A Social and Political Portrait. Free Press,1960 (Updated 1971). Speaker: David Segal, Universityof Maryland

May 20, 2008 Millett, Allan R. The War for Korea,1945-1950: A House Burning (Modern War Studies).Lawrence, Kan.: University Press of Kansas, 2005.Speaker: Janet Valentine, Historian, Air NationalGuard

June 17, 2008 Reynolds, Clark. The Fast Carriers: TheForging of an Air Navy. New York: McGraw Hill, 1968(Naval Institute Press 1992). Speaker: Curtis Utz,Naval Historical Center

Readers are invited to submit listings of upcomingevents Please include the name of the organization,title of the event, dates and location of where it will beheld, as well as contact information. Send listings to:

Air Power History11908 Gainsborough Rd.Potomac, MD 20854E-mail: [email protected]

Miller, Roger G. “Like a Thunderbolt”: TheLafayette Escadrille and the Advent of AmericanPursuit in World War I. Washington, D.C.: AirForce History and Museums Program, 2007. Maps.Photographs. Notes. Appendices. Pp. v, 68.

Ottaway, Susan. Dambusters: The Life of GuyGibson, VC,DSO*, DFC*. UK: Pen & Sword, 1994.Appendices. Index. Pp. xii, 196. $24.95 PaperbackISBN: 1-84415-605-4

Tomaselli, Phil. Tracing Your Air Force Ancestors.UK: Pen & Sword. [Family History]. Maps. Tables.Illustrations. Photographs. Notes. Appendices.Glossary. Bibliography. Index. Pp. 211. $19.95Paperback ISBN:

Winter, Frank H., Ed. History of Rockets andAstronautics: Proceedings of the Thirty-ThirdHistory Symposium of the International Academy

of Astronautics, Amsterdam,The Netherlands,1999. [AAS History Series, Vol. 28; IAA HistorySymposia, Vol. 19]. San Diego, Calif.: AAS Publica-tions Office, 2007. Illustrations. Photographs.Notes. Index. Pp. xvi, 544. $70.00 Paperback ISBN:0-87703-540-4

Wise, James E. Jr. and Scott Baron. The NavyCross: Extraordinary Heroism in Iraq, Afghani-stan, and Other Conflicts. Annapolis: Md.: NavalInstitute Press, 2007. Maps. Photographs. Notes.Bibliography. Index. Pp. xiv, 250. $34.95 ISBN: 1-59114-845-3

Wright, Robert K., Jr. and John T. Greenwood.Airborne Forces at War: From Parachute TestPlatoon to the 21st Century. Annapolis, Md.: NavalInstitute Press, 2007 [in association with AUSA]Maps. Illustrations. Photographs. Bibliography.Index. Pp. ix, 214. $39.95 ISBN: 1-59114-028-3


The President’s Message

The value of recording and studying history is subject to nearly as many dif-fering viewpoints as is religion, although I’m not aware of any wars or deathsresulting from its disputing parties. Of course, few would deny that history is atleast interesting, lest why so many rows devoted to history at book stores, a spe-cial television network, and Ken Burns?

But answers to the following questions are tougher: Can knowledge of his-tory have any impact—or ought it to have an impact—on decisions of the cur-rent day? Or the counterpart: through ignorance does lack of knowledge of his-tory have its own impact? And implied in both questions, the grand slam: Doesknowledge of history deliver better outcomes than ignorance?

It shouldn’t surprise you to know, since you are reading a magazine commit-ted to the importance of United States Air Force history, that I believe it useful,maybe even mandatory, to know about the past—and the more you know thebetter. I believe such knowledge leads to understanding the culture we inhabit,why some things are important, why others are not, why things happen the waythey do, and why challenging a cultural norm might be difficult (though worthit) or maybe just stupid.


At the same time, I also believe it is possible to pull out of history examplesthat are completely irrelevant to modern decision-making, just as it is possibleto thwart healthy change from the effects of history too strictly applied. Howwell one sorts the relevant from the irrelevant is a crucial skill, forming the basisfor countless PhD dissertations, tons of historical treatises, thousands of historyprofessors, and more symposia than anyone could attend. But that doesn’tdiminish the importance of the attempt. On the contrary, it argues for maximumattention and rigor.

Unfortunately, it is my impression, supported by observations from morecredible sources that the study of history—and the accompanying respect for his-tory—in this society is declining. Seemingly, it is taught in public and privateschools from middle school through post-graduate studies less often and with lessenthusiasm and less competence each year. I will leave my opinion of the rea-sons for this trend for another day, but will enthusiastically assert that, if it is afact, it potentially contributes to a dangerously rootless and shallow society.

We are trying in our small domain to do our part in the cause of history. Ihope you will join us, if you haven’t already done so, in this campaign. You’ll findour website helpful in this regard, plus you can join the Air Force HistoricalFoundation there.

How about sharing your ideas with us about the value of recording andstudying history, particularly U.S. Air Force history? Send them to us at:

Air Power Historyc/o Jacob Neufeld11908 Gainsborough Rd.Potomac, MD [email protected]

We’ll consider posting the best of them on our website and in this magazine.I’ll look forward to hearing from you. Hope you have a pleasant spring readinghistory.

Lt. Gen. Michael A. Nelson, USAF (Ret.)President Air Force Historical Foundation

AWARD WINNERS, 2007

NOMINATIONS OPEN FOR SPAATZ AND HOLLEY AWARDS

Last year the Air Force Historical Foundation created two new awards: the General Carl “Tooey” SpaatzAward and the Major General I. B. Holley Award.

The Spaatz Award recognizes a living person(s) who has made a significant and sustained, contribution tothe making of Air Force history during a lifetime of service. This award is named for General Carl A. “Tooey”Spaatz, the first Chief of Staff of the Air Force and the first President of the Air Force Historical Foundation.Secretary of the Air Force, the Honorable Michael W. Wynne, presented the award to General David C. Jones,retired, (below left) the Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff (June 1978-June 1982) and Chief of Staff of theAir Force (July 1974-June1978), at a banquet on October 16, 2007. General Jones’s wife, Lois, and other fam-ily members and friends attended the banquet and presentation, as did General Spaatz’s daughter, CarlaSpaatz Thomas, and four Spaatz grandchildren. General Jones spoke with candor and humor of his forty-year military career and of the aspects in which he takes justifiable pride.

The Holley Award recognizes a living person(s) who has made a sustained, significant contribution to theresearch, interpretation, and documentation of Air Force history during a lifetime of service. The first annualHolley Award, named for a retired USAF Reserve officer who has taught military history at Duke Universityfor 60 years, was presented to General Holley himself. General Holley, better known at Duke as ProfessorHolley, was informed in late summer that he would be unable to travel to receive the award due to healthconcerns. In the absence of Dr. Holley, the Air Force Chief of Staff, General T. Michael Moseley, presented theaward to Mr. Dick Anderegg, Director of Air Force History and Museums Policies and Programs, (above right)in the absence of Dr. Holley, at a luncheon on October 17, 2007. On January 22, 2008, a group of four fromthe Foundation, led by the President Lt. Gen. Michael A. Nelson, accompanied by Mr. Anderegg, drove toDurham, North Carolina to present the award to Dr. Holley in a public ceremony. After lunch at the home ofProfessor and Mrs. Alex Roland, Dr. Holley treated his guests to a guided tour of the Duke University cam-pus. The day’s events were capped by the award presentation in the university’s ornate Old Trinity Room.(facing page) Among those present were Dr. Holley’s wife Janet, other family members, a Duke vice presi-dent, and several colleagues and friends from the community. General Nelson spoke for the Foundation, andMr. Anderegg presented the award trophy. Professor Holley spoke briefly, saying that the most thrillingaspect of the award for him in this tough year was the approval of his peers and professional colleagues forthe Foundation having named the award for him.


The Honorable Michael W. Wynne, the Secretary of the Air Force, and

Foundation 1st Vice Chairman General John A. Shaud present the

General Carl “Tooey” Spaatz Award for 2008 to General David C. Jones.

Air Force Chief of Staff General T. Michael Moseley presents the Major

General I. B. Holley Award for 2007 to Mr Dick Anderegg, who accepted

on behalf of General (Professor) Holley, who was unable to travel to the

award ceremony.

NOMINATIONS FOR 2008

The Air Force Historical Foundation will present its second annual Spaatz and Holley Awardsduring a banquet in the Fall of 2008; the exact date and venue are in coordination. The follow-ing process has been approved by the President, pending Board of Directors action on April 3,2008.

PURPOSE OF AWARDS: As outlined above, the Air Force Historical Foundation’s GeneralCarl A. “Tooey” Spaatz Award recognizes a living person(s) who has made a sustained, signifi-cant contribution to the making of Air Force history during a lifetime of service. The Air ForceHistorical Foundation Major General I. B. Holley Award recognizes a living person(s) who hasmade a sustained, significant contribution to the research, interpretation, and documentation ofAir Force history during a lifetime of service. The processes for both awards are the same thisyear.

WHO MAY NOMINATE: Any current member of the Air Force Historical Foundation membermay nominate a person(s) for these awards. Nominations will be accepted by the Foundation’sExecutive Director any time during the six month period following the previous award presen-tation (in this case, until April 30, 2008). The nomination should be brief – not longer than onepage – and highlight significant contributions. After the selection process is completed, the nom-inating member will be asked to provide the winner’s biography which will be incorporated intothe citation to accompany the award.

SELECTION PROCESS: The Foundation President, with the advice of the Board of Directors,will select the ultimate winner of each award.


Lt Gen Michael A. Nelson speaks before the award presentation to General Holley.


My compliments on a superb issue of AirPower History [Vol. 54, No. 4. Winter2007]. Wonderful insights and anecdotes,and fascinating history.

Jacques Paul Klein, Under Secretary-General of the United Nations (Ret.),McLean, Virginia.

Regarding “Session I, Emerging AirPower: The World War II Era,” [Winter2007, Air Power History, Vol. 54, No. 4],page 21. Colonel Taylor was mistaken inhis assertion that Ted Timberlake got aMedal of Honor (MOH) for the August 1,1943 Ploesti attacks. Two group comman-ders and one acting commander receivedthe MOH—Col. Leon Johnson, leader ofthe 44th Bomb Group; Col. John Kane,leader of the 98th Bomb Group; and Lt.Col. Addison Baker, who commanded the93d Bomb Group instead of Timberlake.(Timberlake was denied participation onthe orders of either General Arnold orBrereton, or both.) Baker’s co-pilot, Maj.John Jerstad received his medal posthu-mously, along with Lt. Lloyd Hughes ofthe 389th, who bombed with Col. JackWood’s Group on Campina Red target tothe north of Ploesti. Lt. Brian Favelle flewthe route lead aircraft of the 376th BombGroup. Favelle and his crew spun in overthe Mediterranean approaching Corfu;they did not crash in Turkey, as alleged.His wingman, Lt. Gus Iovine, circled tolocate survivors; finding none he abortedthe mission and returned to base. Col. K.K. Compton commanded the 376th andfrom every post-mission account was the“leader” of his group over the mountainsand on to the target area. Compton, aheadof all groups after airborne difficultiessplit up the five-group bomber streamafter Corfu, led his group and the 93d (intrail) over the pre-IP at Targoviste. Hemistook this village for the briefed IP ofFloresti, and subsequently directed thewrong turn there—driving the 376th andthe 93d toward Bucharest instead ofPloesti. The 93d, led by Lt. Col. Baker,realizing the error almost immediately,split off and began driving due southwestto northeast, toward the target area. Thisadded to the ensuing aircraft track dilem-mas over the targets that were briefed forColonel Kane (White IV) and ColonelJohnson (White V) whose forces drove intotheir targets (already mostly aflame) oncourse, as prescribed, on a briefed south-easterly course some thirty minutes later.Colonel Compton’s 376th Group (with themission commander, General Ent, aboard)never hit their briefed target except forMaj. Norm Appold and his element, whopeeled off to strike a 376th target. Afterdiscovering their error, the entire group

circled to the southeast and east and leftBucharest. Colonel Wood’s 389th hit theirassigned target of Campina Red.Additionally, another target that wasobliterated was not mentioned. Col. JimPosey and pilot John Diehl (44th BombGroup) hit the Blue Target, the CreditulMinier at Brazi, concurrent with ColonelJohnson’s White V strike. The film spon-sored by the Mormon Church that ColonelTaylor mentioned concerned WalterStewart, a pilot in the 93d Group, whoflew the ship Utah Man. One final note,Roger Freeman’s book, The Ploesti Raid,[London: Battle of Britain InternationalLtd. ISBN: 1-870067-55-X] is a treasuretrove of information for anyone interestedin the Ploesti mission.

Colonel Robert E. Vickers, USAF (Ret.),Taos, New Mexico.

USAF Pilot Training Class 58J willhold its 50th Anniversary Reunion April8-11 in Dayton, Ohio. Contact:

PTC 58J3349Arnold LaneFalls Church, VA 22042e-mail: [email protected]

Strategic Air Command will hold areunion and dedication of the SAC Memo-rial April 30-May 4, 2008, in Dayton, Ohio.

UPT Class 68-08, Laredo, Texas willhold a reunion in June 2008, location to bedetermined. Anyone interested contact:

Putt Richards(808) 638-0268e-mail: [email protected]

B–47 Stratojet Association will hold areunion September 25-27 in Marietta,Georgia. Anyone associated with or inter-ested in the B–47 is cordially invited.Contact:

Bob Bowman(703) 826=5562e-mail: [email protected]

Strategic Air Command AirborneCommand and Control Association(SAC ACCA) will hold a reunion October15-19, 2008, in Dayton, Ohio. Contact:

Wilton Curtis(804) 740-2290e-mail: [email protected]

The Association of Air Force Missi-leers will hold a reunion, October 9-13,2008, at the Hyatt Dulles, Herndon,Virginia. Contact:

AAFMPO Box 5693Breckenridge, CO 80424www.afmissileers.org

USAF Pilot Class 53A will hold areunion October 23-26, 2008, at theDoubletree Hotel, San Antonio, Texas.Contact:

Maj. Gen Wayne [email protected]@[email protected]

“Father of U.S. Army Aviation”Honored

Brig. Gen. William Wallace Ford, USA(Ret.) was inducted into the KentuckyAviation Hall of Fame in Lexington onNovember 3, 2007. A West Point graduate(class of 1920), he served on the ROTCstaff at Eastern Kentucky Universityfrom 1937-1940. An air enthusiast, Fordearned a private pilot’s license. He recog-nized the military benefit of light aircraftfor artillery batteries, observing from theair and providing firing instructions.Writing in the Field Artillery Journal,Ford outlined his theories on “air observa-tion posts.” An experimental programgrew from this article, and Ford laterbecame Director of Air Training at FortSill, Oklahoma. General Ford’s innova-tions and service earned him the title“Father of U.S. Army Aviation.” He died in1986.

Letters

Reunions

Readers are invited to submit listings ofupcoming or reunion events Pleaseinclude the name of the organization, titleof the event, dates and location of where itwill be held, as well as contact informa-tion. Send listings to:

Air Power History11908 Gainsborough Rd.Potomac, MD 20854E-mail: [email protected]

News


Brig. Gen. Paul Warfield Tibbetts, Jr., USAF (Ret.)1915-2007

Paul W. Tibbets Jr., died at his home in Columbus,Ohio, on November 1, 2007, at the age of ninety-two. Hewas best known as commander of the Boeing B–29Enola Gay, which dropped the atomic bomb onHiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945.

Born on February 23, 1915 in Quincy, Illinois, Paulwas nine when the Tibbets family moved to Miami,Florida. In 1928, his father enrolled him in the WesternMilitary Academy in North Alton, Illinois. He attendedthe University of Florida at Gainesville in 1933, buttransferred to the University of Cincinnati for pre-medstudies. His love of flying, dating back to a 1927 rideaboard barnstormer Doug Davis’s plane, won out over acareer in medicine. Tibbets joined the Army Air Corps in1937 and after flying the Consolidated PT–3 biplanetrainer and the North American BT–9 low-wing mono-plane at Randolph Field, Texas, was awarded his wingsin February 1938. Although he graduated with the high-est cumulative scores in his class, he selected an obser-vation assignment rather than a tour in fighters. Heflew the Douglas O–46 high-wing monoplane at Fort

Benning, Georgia. He was meticulous about following flight rules and was also dedicated to perfectionin the air. He remained at Fort Benning until 1940. During those happy years he was married, had chil-dren and was able to fly the North American O–47 and the Martin B–10. Tibbets also hunted and shotskeet with Lt. Col. George Patton during his years at Benning.

In June 1941, Tibbets was transferred to the A–20 Attack aircraft as a member of the 90thSquadron, Third Attack Group located in Savannah, Georgia. Shortly after the Japanese attack uponPearl Harbor, Hawaii, Captain Tibbets was reassigned to fly the new B–18 twin-engine bomber. Hisunit began patrolling the east coast on the lookout for German U-boats. He next moved to MacDill AirBase, near Tampa, where he began to check out young pilots in the brand new, four-engine B–17 FlyingFortress. Tibbets, rapidly promoted to major, was part of the first deployment of B–17s to England—Operation Bolero. It was from this initial deployment experience that the book, Twelve O’clock High,was written. Tibbets was the young major who was assigned as the unit executive officer in an effortto improve base security and elevate morale.

On August 17, 1942, Tibbets led the first American heavy bomber raid against German-occupiedtargets in Rouen, France. Tibbets dropped the first strategic bombs of the war. While in Europe, onevery raid, Tibbets always flew in the lead plane. He was wounded on August 24th on another raid andreceived the Purple Heart.

In October, Tibbets was selected as one of two pilots to fly a secret liaison mission from England toGibraltar. Then, in November 1942, Tibbets flew Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower to Gibraltar in anticipa-tion of the invasion of North Africa—Operation Torch—in which Tibbets also participated as a bomberpilot leading the first heavy bomber raid in the North African Theater of Operations.

Soon Tibbets joined the Twelfth Air Force acting as bombardment chief for the commander, Maj.Gen. Jimmy Doolittle. During this time at Algiers, Doolittle and Tibbets flew together on a memorableMartin B–26 Marauder flight. Several B–26 crews had crashed during operations due either to poor

In Memoriam


control during engine-out situations, or failure by the crew to set the aircraft batteries to the “charge”position prior to takeoff. Tibbets recalled that Doolittle took off, killed one of the engines and featheredthe prop while executing high performance maneuvers, including a loop-the-loop, before restarting thedead engine prior to a successful landing. This flight set a tone for the B–26 crews that the Maraudercould be flown properly with some practice and patience.

Because of his combat experience and excellent airmanship—and partially to avoid a personalityconflict with his commander—Tibbets was ordered back to the U.S. to participate in the testing of thenew high-altitude bomber, the Boeing B–29 Superfortress. In September 1944, he was selected to orga-nize and command the secret 509th Composite Group, which was assigned to deliver the newly devel-oped atomic bombs. After several months of preparation and practice flying from the Pacific island ofTinian, Tibbets took off with his crew and six other B–29s on August 6, 1945, in the Enola Gay, a B–29named after his mother and specially modified to carry “Little Boy,” the first atomic bomb. Six and ahalf hours later, at 8:15 a.m. local time, the Enola Gay dropped the weapon that destroyed Hiroshimaand hastened the end of World War II. The 509th then relocated to Walker Air Force Base in NewMexico and participated in the nuclear tests at Bikini Atoll during that period—Operation Crossroads.

After attending the Air Command and Staff College at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, ColonelTibbets was assigned to the Pentagon and served as the director of the Strategic Air Division. As thebomber branch chief he worked closely with Boeing during the development of the six jet engine, swept-wing B–47 Stratofortress until February 1952. There, he flew with the legendary Boeing test pilot,“Tex” Johnson, who taught Tibbets what the B–47 could really do in the air. During these years, Tibbetswas also the subject of a Hollywood movie about the Hiroshima mission—Above and Beyond, releasedin 1952. The film, although exaggerated in places, communicated many of the personal and emotionalissues related to the crewmen in the 509th Group.

Following a stint at the Air War College in 1955, Tibbets’ next assignment was director of war plans,Allied Air Forces in Central Europe at Fontainebleau, France. In 1956, he returned to the United Statesto command the 308th Bomb Wing located at Hunter AFB, Georgia. In just one year, under Tibbets’strict discipline and leadership, the 308th went from a lowly unit to the top of the ratings. In January1958, Tibbets was reassigned to MacDill AFB, Florida, where he assumed command of the ailing 6thAir Division. With this command came the star of a brigadier general. Again, the new general whippedthe base into shape with strict discipline and ruthless personnel changes. Soon, the 6th AD was on itsway to recovery as the largest SAC base in the country.

From February 1961 until mid-1964, General Tibbets was assigned to Headquarters Air Force asdirector of management analysis. During his last two years of Air Force service, Tibbets traveled to NewDelhi, India, as part of the American military mission there. After his retirement in 1966, he beganwork for a commuter aviation company initially in Geneva, Switzerland, called Executive Jet Aviation,later becoming its president. For the past two decades, Tibbets had been an active participant on theinternational air show circuit and also was a frequent public speaker at military and civil events.

During his thirty-year-long military career, General Tibbets was a command pilot. His military dec-orations included the Distinguished Service Cross, Distinguished Flying Cross, Legion of Merit, PurpleHeart, Commendation Medal and Air Medal. General Tibbets is survived by his wife, Andrea; sons PaulTibbets III, Gene, and James; six grandchildren; and several great-grandchildren. Tibbets and his firstwife, Lucy, divorced in 1955.

Brig. Gen. Paul W. Tibbets visited the Enola Gay for the final time in 2005. While in the cockpit herecounted stories of how he loved his crewmen and how well they had executed their mission—a mis-sion that heralded the end of World War II. His personal views of the 509th Bomb Group missionaccomplishment never changed during his lifetime. “I am content that we did what reason compelledand duty dictated.”


Col. Arval James “Robie” Roberson, USAF (Ret.)1923-2007

Col. Arval James Roberson, 84, died unexpectedly on December 7, 2007 in Kilmarnock, Virginia.Born in Indiana in November 1923, he grew up in Inglewood, California. He entered the Army AirCorps in June 1942 as an aviation cadet and was commissioned as a pilot in May 1943.

He flew 76 missions in the ETO in the P-51 Mustang with the 362d FS, 357th FG, destroying 6-1/2enemy aircraft and one probable in the air, as well as one on the ground. He returned to the U.S. as acaptain in time for his 20th birthday in November 1943.

After his return from England, he had assignments in Nevada, Florida, and Illinois. In Chicago, hefirst flew the C–47, known as the “Gooney Bird” and over the next 20 years flew that aircraft inter-mittently for a total of almost 950 hours. In 1949 and 1950, he flew out of bases in Kansas, Indiana,and Michigan.

During the Korean War, he flew 100 combat missions in the F–51 with the 12th FS, 18th FBW. Henext had assignments in Kentucky and then England where he flew the F–84 and finally in Belgiumwith Military Assistance Advisory Group. On return to the U.S., he became adjutant for the group head-quarters at Luke AFB. From there in 1955 he went to his favorite assignment, Support SquadronCommander at the Auxiliary Field at Gila Bend, Arizona.

He next returned to Brussels, where he flew the VC–47. He then went to Headquarters, AirTraining Command at Randolph AFB, Texas, and to Florida with the Tactical Air Warfare Center. In1965 he entered his third war as Liaison Officer to the VN JCS in Vietnam. He managed to also fly 26combat support missions in the C–47.

From Vietnam he went to France as the Chief, Logistics Branch, and was promoted to colonel inAugust 1966. He then went to Sembach Air Base, Germany, as Vice Wing Commander, 603d ABW andthen as Commander, 60151 Combat Support Group. There, in 1970, he went to Otis AFB,Massachusetts, from which he retired as the last USAF base commander on March 1, 1973.

In total, he had flown twenty different aircraft for almost 4,000 hours, but his favorite was alwaysthe P–51 Mustang. During his thirty-one years of military service Colonel Roberson received the fol-lowing decorations and awards: the DFC with 3 Oak Leaf Clusters (OLCs), Bronze Star, Air Medal with15 OLCs, Meritorious Service Medal with one OLC, Army Commendation Medal, American CampaignMedal, Europe-Africa-Middle East Campaign Medal, World War II Victory Medal, Korean ServiceMedal, Vietnamese Service Medal, United Nations Medal, Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal,Presidential Unit Citation, Republic of Korea Presidential Citation, Croix de Guerre with Palm,Vietnamese Medal of Honor, Russian Freedom Medal, and the Occupation Award Army Air Corps.

Roberson is survived by his wife of 31 years, Dr. Mildred Roberson, a daughter, a son, and severalgrandchildren from a previous marriage.

In Memoriam

Available atWWW.GPO.GOV


Our winter mystery aircraft was the one-of-a-kind Convair XC–99 cargo aircraft, based on the B-36 bomber.

Designed in 1942, the XC–99 was powered bysix 28-cylinder Pratt &Whitney R–4360-35 radial“pusher” engines rated at 3000 horsepower each.

The XC–99’s cavernous double-deck interiorwas designed to carry 400 combat troops or 101,000pounds of cargo. Only slightly smaller in somedimensions than today’s C–5 Galaxy, the XC–99was the largest aircraft in the world in the 1950sand is the largest piston-engine aircraft ever built.

Our fall issue’s photo showed the XC–99 mak-ing its maiden flight at the Convair San Diegoplant on November 23, 1947. The aircraft was sta-tioned throughout its operational life from 1949 to1957 at Kelly Air Force Base, Texas. Some crew-members were Air Force civilians. In 1951 and1952, the XC–99 hauled seven million pounds ofsupplies in support of the Korean War effort.

The XC–99 never failed to amaze when it ap-peared at air shows. At one open house event whilethe plane was still very much an operational partof the Air Force, a woman asked pilot Capt. Jim C.Douglas, “How will you move this thing from here?”

Douglas replied, “We fly it, lady.”The woman quickly retorted, “Young man,

what kind of a fool do you take me for?”In 1957, examining the plane’s condition, experts

concluded that $1,000,000 in immediate maintenancewould be necessary to keep it airworthy.The Air Forceretired the XC–99. It was derelict for decades.

Retired Maj. Gen. Charles Metcalf, director ofthe National Museum of the U.S. Air Force, said hebelieves the plane can be preserved for future gen-erations, but not quickly or easily.

Today, some of the XC–99 is in the museum’srestoration hangar, but most of it still at the formerKelly Field awaiting movement to Dayton. Accor-ding to the museum’s Robert J. Bardua, restorersnow have the leading and trailing edges of thewings, wing tips, horizontal and vertical stabilizers,flight controls, tail section, engines and propellers.The rest will come later, Bardua said.

Our follow-up image is a rarely-seen official AirForce photo showing the XC–99 near the end of itsservice career.

Our XC–99 “name the plane” winner is DavidBragg of Albuquerque, N. M., who submitted hisentry while on duty in Iraq. Mr. Bragg will receivea copy of the new book Hell Hawks: The UntoldStory of the American Pilots Who Savaged Hitler’sWehrmacht, by Robert F. Dorr and Thomas D. Joneswhen the book is published on April 4.

Can you identify our latest “mystery” aircraft,shown here? For a clue as to where it was taken:this is a photo by Robert F. Dorr. But remember therules, please:

1. Submit your entry on a postcard to Robert F.Dorr, 3411 Valewood Drive, Oakton VA 22124, or bye-mail to [email protected].

2. Name the aircraft shown here. Include yourpostal mailing address and telephone number.Last time around, several entries had to be dis-qualified for not including a phone number.

3. A winner, picked from among correctentries, will receive a copy of the Hell Hawks his-tory book.

This feature needs your help. Do you have a

photo of a rare or little-known aircraft? We’llreturn any photos provided for use here.

ThisIssue’sMysteryPlane

History Mysteryby Robert F. Dorr

Documents

WWW AFHISTORICALFOUNDATION ORG · SPRING 2008-Volume 55,Number 1 16 28 ... (Ret) Lt Gen Russell C. Davis, USAF (Ret) CMSgt Rick Dean, USAF (Ret) Lt Gen Marvin R. Esmond, USAF (Ret)