Curtis LeMay
Curtis Emerson LeMay (November 15, 1906 – October 1, 1990) was a General in the United States Air Force. He is credited with designing and implementing an effective systematic strategic bombing campaign in the Pacific Theatre of World War II. After the war, he headed the Berlin airlift, then reorganized the Strategic Air Command into an effective means of conducting nuclear war. Others, however, characterized him as a belligerent warmonger (even nicknaming him "Bombs Away Lemay") whose aggressiveness threatened to inflame tense Cold War situations such as the Cuban Missile Crisis into open war between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Biography
Born and raised in Columbus, Ohio, he studied civil engineering at Ohio State University. He joined the Air Corps in 1928 and became an officer through the ROTC. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in 1930. He married Helen E. Maitland (died 1994) on the 9th of June 1934 with whom he had one child - Patricia Jane LeMay Lodge.
He transferred to bomber aircraft in 1937 and soon demonstrated his abilities. When his crews were not flying missions they were being subjected to his relentless training as he believed that training was the key to saving their lives. The men called him "Iron Ass" because he demanded so much but he was immensely respected.
One story has it that he approached a fully-fueled bomber with his ever-present cigar stuck firmly between his lips. When asked by a guard to put it out as it might ignite the fuel, LeMay replied, "It wouldn't dare."
At the outbreak of World War II he was a group commander in the Eighth Air Force. By early 1942 he was a lieutenant colonel and directed the 305th Group into action over Europe. He was given command of the 3rd Bombardment Division in late 1942. He often demonstrated his courage by personally leading his bombers on dangerous missions, including what many regard as the most dangerous mission ever flown - the October 14, 1943 attack on the Regensberg, Germany ball bearing plant. The Air Corp lost half of the 1,000 planes launched that day - a day that has gone down in Air Force history as 'Black Thursday.' Of the 291 B-17 planes involved in that raid, 60 were shot down; 5 crashed and were destroyed on return; 12 were scrapped after landing as un-repairable; and 121 had to be repaired in some fashion before returning to flying status. Only 93 aircraft returned intact.
This massive but ineffective raid on a ball bearing plant 500 miles inside enemy territory, the second of its kind and both conducted without fighter cover, outraged the American public and led the Air Corp to halt daylight precision bombing until February 1944.
In July 1944 LeMay transferred to the Pacific Theater. He was promoted to major general and directed first the XX Bomber Command and then the XXI Bomber Command in India.
LeMay soon concluded that his bombers were dropping their bombs near their targets only 5% of the time, and that losses of aircraft and crews were unsustainably high. LeMay became convinced that continuing high-altitude, precision bombing would be ineffective, given the usual cloudy weather over Japan. He switched to low-altitude, incendiary attacks on Japanese cities. Precision bombing was conducted weather permitting only.
LeMay commanded B-29 operations against Japan, including the massive incendiary attacks on sixty four Japanese cities. This included the firebombing of Tokyo on March 9 - March 10, 1945. For this first attack LeMay removed the armaments on 325 B-29s, loaded each plane with firebomb clusters and ordered the bombers out at 5 - 9,000 feet over Tokyo. The first planes arrived over Tokyo just after midnight on March 10. In a three hour period they dropped 1,665 tons of incendiary bombs killing more than 100,000 civilians and incinerating 16 square miles of the city.
Precise figures are not available but the firebombing and nuclear bombing campaign against Japan, directed by LeMay between March, 1945 and the Japanese surrender in August, 1945, may have killed more than one million Japanese civilians. Official estimates from the United States Strategic Bombing Survey put the figures at 330,000 people killed, 476,000 injured, 8.5 million people made homeless and 2.5 million buildings destroyed. Nearly half the built-up areas of sixty-four cities were totally destroyed.
"There are no innocent civilians, so it doesn't bother me so much to be killing innocent bystanders." The New York Times reported at the time, "Maj. Gen. Curtis E. LeMay, commander of the B-29fs of the entire Marianas area, declared that if the war is shortened by a single day the attack will have served its purpose."
LeMay referred to his nightime incendiary attacks as "fire jobs." The Japanese nicknamed him "brutal LeMay" (鬼畜ルメイ). LeMay was quite aware of both the brutality of his actions and the Japanese opinion of him - he once remarked that had the U.S. lost the war, he fully expected to be tried for war crimes. However, he argued that it was his duty to carry out the attacks.
Roosevelt and Truman justified these tactics by referring to an estimate that one million American troops would be killed if Japan had to be invaded (this estimate later turned out to be untrue; the highest casualty estimate produced by the U.S. Military was around 40,000 dead). Additionally, the Japanese had decentralized their armament industries into small workshops in civilian districts, which (according to the rationale) made these areas legitimate military targets.
In addition, LeMay oversaw Operation Starvation, an aerial mining operation against Japanese waterways and ports which disrupted the Japanese shipping and food distribution logistics.
Post-war he was briefly transferred to The Pentagon as Deputy Chief of Air Staff for Research & Development. In 1947 he returned to Europe as commander of USAF Europe, heading operations for the Berlin Airlift in 1948. Under LeMay's direction, C-54 cargo planes that could each carry 10-tons began supplying the city on July 1. By the fall the airlift was bringing in an average of 5,000 tons of supplies a day. The airlift went on for 11 months - 213,000 flights that brought in 1.7 million tons of food and fuel to Berlin. The Soviets gave up and opened up the land corridors to the West.
In 1949, he returned to the USA to head the Strategic Air Command, replacing George Kenney. When he took over the SAC, it consisted of little more than a few understaffed B-29 groups left over from World War II. Less than half of the available aircraft were operational, and the crews were undertrained. When he ordered a mock bombing exercise on Dayton, Ohio, most bombers missed their targets by one mile or more.
He headed SAC until 1957, overseeing its transformation into a modern, efficient, all-jet force. Along the way, he acquired a large fleet of new bombers, established a vast aerial refueling system, started many new units and bases, began missile development, and established a strict command and control system. He was appointed Vice Chief of Staff of the United States Air Force in July 1957, serving until 1961 when he was made the fifth Chief of Staff of the United States Air Force on the retirement of Thomas White.
He was not a success as Chief of Staff; he clashed repeatedly with Robert McNamara, Air Force Secretary Eugene Zuckert and Joint Chiefs Chairman General Maxwell Taylor. LeMay was a belligerent and totally committed anti-Communist. His first war plan, drawn up in 1949, proposed delivering "the entire stockpile of atomic bombs in a single massive attack" - dropping 133 atomic bombs on 70 cities within 30 days.
LeMay lost significant appropriation battles (for Skybolt ALBM, and the B-52 replacement, the XB-70.) His wish for a much more vigorous engagement in the Vietnam War (the quote "we should bomb Vietnam back into the stone age" is often attributed to him) did not come true. His passion for promoting strategic air campaigns over tactical strikes and ground support operations became Air Force policy, which disproportionately favoured strategic bombing operations during his tenure. Area bombing of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia led to the deaths and maiming of thousands of innocent civilians during the 1960s and 70s era conflicts in those countries.
During the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, LeMay clashed with John F. Kennedy and Defense Secretary McNamara, arguing that he should be allowed to bomb nuclear sites in Cuba, even though he himself estimated that his planes could take out only about 90 percent of these sites (post-crisis analysis concluded that such attacks would have missed significantly more missiles than that). He opposed the naval blockade, and after the end of the crisis, suggested that Cuba be invaded anyway, even after the Russians agreed to withdraw.
LeMay retired in February 1965 and seemed headed for a political career. His highest political accomplishment was his selection as the Vice Presidential candidate on segregationist George Wallace's 1968 American Independent Party ticket. (Ironically, Wallace had served as a sergeant in a unit commanded by LeMay during World War II.) When Wallace announced his selection in October 1968, LeMay opined that unlike many Americans, he clearly did not fear using nuclear weapons. LeMay's saber-rattling did not help the Wallace campaign.
He was honored by several countries receiving the Air Medal with 3 oak leaf clusters, the Distinguished Flying Cross with 2 oak leaf clusters, the Distinguished Service Cross, Distinguished Service Medal with 2 oak leaf clusters, the French Legion of Honor and the Silver Star. On December 7, 1964 the Japanese government conferred on him the First Order of Merit with the Grand Cordon of the Rising Sun. He was elected to the Alfalfa Club in 1957 and he served as a general for seventeen years. He is buried in the United States Air Force Academy Cemetery at Colorado Springs, Colorado.
Works
Books
- (with MacKinlay Kantor) Mission with LeMay: My Story (Doubleday, 1965) ISBN B00005WGR2
- (with Dale O. Smith) America is in Danger (Funk & Wagnalls, 1968) ISBN B00005VCVX
- (with Bill Yenne) Superfortress: The Story of the B-29 and American Air Power (McGraw-Hill, 1988) ISBN 0070371601
Film
As Himself
- The Last Bomb (Documentary, 1945)
- In the Year of the Pig (Documentary, 1968)
- The World at War (Documentary TV Series, 1974)
- Race for the Superbomb (Documentary, 1999)
- JFK (Movie, 1991)
- Roots of the Cuban Missile Crisis (Documentary, 2001)
- The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara (Documentary, 2003)
- DC3:ans sista resa (Documentary, 2004)
As Based on Him
- Dr. Strangelove (character of General Buck Turgidson, played by actor George C. Scott) (Movie, 1964)
- Thirteen Days (character of General LeMay, played by actor Kevin Conway) (Movie, 2003)
References
- Thomas M. Coffey, 1986. Iron Eagle: The Turbulent Life of General Curtis LeMay. Random House. ISBN 0517551888.
- Robert S. McNamara, 1995. In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam. Vintage Press. ISBN 0679767495. (See pages 114-115).
- Albert Atkins, 2001. Air Marshall Sir Arthur Harris and General Curtis E. Lemay: A Comparative Analytical Biography. AuthorHouse. ISBN 0759659400.
- Alfonso A. Narvez. "Gen. Curtis LeMay, an Architect of Strategic Air Power, Dies at 83". The New York Times. October 2, 1990.
- Graham Allison. Essence of Decision:Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis (1971 – updated 2nd edition, 1999). Longman. ISBN 0321013492.
- Moscow, Warren. "City’s Heart Gone." The New York Times. 11 Mar. 1945: 1, 13.
External links
