Command and Control of the Airlift - The Early Days
The history of the world has been shaped by generals. Alexander the Great, Caesar, Saladin, Richard the Lionheart, Henry V, George Washington, Napoleon -- everyone has heard their names. Yet while no battle can be won by any general on his own, poor leadership can doom a campaign or lose a war. The Berlin Airlift was no exception. Regardless of the dedication and skills of the participants, without good leadership and competent command, it too would have failed.
The first vulnerability of the Western Allies was the very fact that they were three sovereign states each with their own priorities and agenda. Indeed, given the history of friction between the U.S. and France over German policy, Stalin had every reason to believe that the Western Powers would start bickering among themselves and fail to agree on a joint policy at all. Stalin must have hoped that he could drive a wedge between the Western powers and exploit their differences.
That the West did find a common policy and even a common voice is in large measure due to an initiative by Bevin and the daily efforts of three diplomats, all but forgotten by history. Just two days after the start of the Blockade, Bevin proposed to the United States the establishment of a co-ordinating committee composed of the U.S. and French Ambassadors to London, and Sir William Strang of the British Foreign Office. These senior diplomats knew each other well, and had been working well and closely together in the preceding months. Furthermore, they all enjoyed the confidence of their political masters, allowing them a large degree of self-sufficiency in day-to-day matters. This committee proved an invaluable asset in ensuring that the Western Allies “spoke with one voice” on the issue of Berlin. (Below Strang in 1947)
Furthermore, although the two military governors had command authority over their respective armies of occupation – and the attached air forces of occupation – they did not exercise direct control over the air force units pouring in from around the world and assigned to the Airlift. This meant that, while the army side of operations worked more or less from the start (after the establishment of appropriate subordinate command structures), the air force operations suffered from initial confusion.
In the British Zone, the tensions between Air Transport Command and the British Air Forces of Occupation (BAFO) was evident right from the start. It resulted, for example, in two Group Captains with identical instructions (to command all transport operations) being sent to take command of Wunstorf – one was sent from BAFO and the other from Transport Command. And just to add spice to the soup, Wunstorf was still a fighter base at the time and so under Fighter Command orders.
Under the circumstances, it is not surprising that a Squadron Leader of Transport Command remembers bringing seven Dakotas to Wunstorf and finding neither marshallers to direct his aircraft to a hardstanding nor anyone at Station HQ who could tell him what to do with them. From the point of view of the airmen trying to provide services to the pilots, the situation was hardly better. Norman Hurst, who worked as an operations clerk, remembers the operations room being relocated at frequent intervals, moving about the airfield like a gypsy. It eventually came to rest in a collection of Nissan huts located near the aircraft hardstandings. This hut also housed the Army dispatch unit responsible for loading and unloading aircraft and the aircraft servicing unit responsible for refuelling and maintenance checks. The Operations clerk was here confronted by nine separate field telephones on one desk – “a nightmare when three or more calls came in at the same time.”[i]
In the American Zone the same conflict of interest had emerged between the Air Forces of Occupation and the transport exports of Military Air Transport Service (MATS) in the U.S. Commanding the U.S. Air Forces in Europe (USAFE) at the time the Airlift began was the already legendary former commander of the U.S. 8th Air Force (1942-1944), General Curtis LeMay. LeMay was credited with developing both pattern bombing and the combat box, as well as the low-level bombing tactics used against Japan in 1945. He was not a man who readily conceded that anyone could do anything better than he could; his successor General Cannon was worse. The problem was that, impressive as their combat credentials were, however, neither man had any experience in air transport much less airlift operations. (Below General LeMay)
Tunner had been one of the first officers in the entire Air Force to specialise in air transport. He had helped establish the Ferrying Division and nurtured it from a handful of men to an organisation 50,000 strong and delivering 11,000 planes a month to domestic and overseas destinations. In fact, he can be largely credited with creating not only an organisation but an entire ethos and standard for air transport pilots. He passionately believed that transport pilots had a different mission and required different qualities than combat pilots. He was proud to claim that he had “proved that air transport was a science in itself; to be carried out at its maximum efficiency air transport must be run by men who … are dedicated to air transport – professionals.”[ii] He had then, in August 1944, taken command the highly risky supply operation across the Himalayas – which had already defeated several previous commanders – and turned it into a spectacular success.
Although Tunner was duly appointed to command the U.S. Airlift operations by the Chief of Staff of the Air Force, he was appointed over the heads of Generals Clay and LeMay – and he was made subordinate to both. Unlike the RAF officers of Transport Command, who were outside the BAFO chain of command, Tunner had to report to LeMay, and, later, to his successor Cannon. LeMay clearly resented the interference from Washington, which “robbed” him of control over an air operation which had captured the imagination of the American press and people.
Tunner arrived in theatre, almost exactly a month after the Airlift had started, on July 25, 1948. What he found was then popularly referred to as the “LeMay Coal and Feed Delivery Service” operating at a frenzy - to the delight of the hoards of journalists which had flocked to Germany to cover the story. It was “fire-alarm haste coupled with a total lack of long-range planning.”[iii]
That lack of long term planning was already starting to have negative effects. Exhaustion was becoming evident among the crews, and “LeMay was now calling on every grounded flier in the command for part-time duty. Yet most pilots, even so, were lucky to snatch seven hours sleep in thirty six.”[iv] Meanwhile, the planning and support work those desk officers were supposed to be doing was not getting done, adding to future problems. Tunner rapidly concluded that the Airlift could not last another month the way it was being run. Tunner later wrote:
My first overall impression was that the situation was just what I had anticipated – a real cowboy operation. Few people knew what they would be doing the next day. Neither flight crews nor ground crews knew how long they’d be there, or the schedules they were working. Everything was temporary…Confusion everywhere.[v]
I read how desk officers took off whenever they got a chance and ran to the flight line to find planes sitting there waiting for them. This was all very exciting, and loads of fun, but successful operations are not built on such methods. If the Airlift was going to succeed and Berlin to remain free, there must be less festivity and more attention to dull details….[vi]
Clearly, things had to change!
[i] Norman Hurst, letter to the author, Jan. 2006.
[ii] William Tunner, Over the Hump, USG Printing Office, 1954, p. 41.
[iii] Richard Collier, Bridge Across the Sky, MacMillan, 1978, p. 69
[iv] Collier, p. 71.
[v] Tunner, p. 167
[vi] Tunner, p. 160.
NOTE: The content of this blog post is based on Helena P. Schrader. The Blockade Breakers. Pen & Sword, 2008
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