8th Air Force Tactical Operations in Europe

[357th_KW]

I found a couple of interesting USAF historical studies delving into the various tactical engagements that the 8th Air Force was involved in, in the ETO.  We see a lot of statements saying that they didn't take part in the kind of tactical warfare that IL-2 simulates.  As illustrated by the below studies, that simply wasn't the case.

 

Tactical Operations of the 8th Air Force

The Employment of Strategic Bombers in a Tactical Role

[MiloMorai]

USAAF Combat Operations in WWll

 

This extraordinary effort by Jack McKillop USAF, based on original work by Kit Carter and Robert Mueller, is presented here as a research aid for all those interested in the involvement of the USAAF in WWll.

 

What you will find in these pages - remarkably - is an exhaustive account of every single operational movement of the USAAF from the day war was declared by the US on December 6 1941 until a month after the final capitulation of Japan in 1945.

 

To those unfamiliar with this subject, the first impression will likely be of the sheer size of this involvement: the number of units and planes, their locations, the logistics of moving them around the globe in a controlled manner. It's all on a huge and unprecedented scale, especially given this was in an age before computers, where everything was done by hand.

Since each page contains hundreds of names, dates and locations, we have provided a Highlighting facility within every page to assist your search for a specific item: just enter the term you are searching for in the Highlighting box and then scroll until you see your selection in yellow. Scroll to the bottom as the facility finds all occurrences.