Posted on 08/03/2013 7:15:16 AM PDT by jmcenanly
This week marks the 70th anniversary of the U.S. Army Air Corps raid on Ploesti, Romania, one of the most heroic episodes in the history of military aviation.
As a result of the twin victories of the Soviets at Stalingrad and of the British at El Alamein in November 1942, the Germans lost their bids to seize either the oil fields of the Caucasus or those of the Middle East. The fuel resources of the Third Reich were thus drastically limited, with the principal supports being the synthetic-oil facilities at Leuna in central Germany and the Romanian oil fields at Ploesti. If these were knocked out, the Nazis would lose their ability to wage mechanized warfare, and their empire would be doomed to rapid collapse.
General Carl Spaatz, of the U.S. Army Air Corps, was the first high-ranking Allied officer to perceive this German weakness, and he started to push for what became known as “the Oil Plan.” But Spaatz was up against the British — who believed that air power could be used to greatest effect in breaking enemy morale through assaults on cities — as well as other American officers who saw greater merit in hitting targets such as aircraft factories, ball-bearing plants, hydroelectric dams, and transport centers. Going around the normal channels, however, Spaatz managed to gain the direct support of President Roosevelt, who approved his plan to launch one very daring raid on Ploesti.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...
“Stryker was the squadron leader. He brought us in real low, but he couldn’t handle it ...”
Ploesti bump.
Ploesti ping
Were you over Macho Grande?
Kind of a Pyrhhic victory, as I recall. Yes, we hit the oil field facilities, but at great cost in aircraft and men... meanwhile, the Germans had the oilfield working again in short order.
German resources went toward re-building oil fields. They did that, but resources were diverted.
American resources went toward building more planes, and training more men.
We had a larger and more resilient industrial base, and a larger population base. We were turning out a plane an hour at the time. Seen as a war of attrition, a Pyrhhic victory was a smart strategy for the USA.
the synthetic-oil facilities at Leuna in central Germany ....................................... I saw one of the factories last year in Northeast Poland near Szczecin and the Baltic. It is still there, but I didn’t notice any activity. Poland has lots of coal to convert if they are doing it.
And we came back, once we had long-range P-51 escorts, and took them out.
Read the whole article at the link, the analogy and conclusion at the end is worth it.
My uncle was a waist gunner in a B-24 in the 98th Bombardment Group. He always told me that they flew so low that they got corn stalks in their intakes. I always wondered if that was true.
Excellent article that should be read all the way through. Zubrin nails it on page three.
notice the horizontal bomb for Ploesti in the strike count...
http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2512/3877641656_ef6e4b2a6e_z.jpg?zz=1
Yeah, I read the whole thing... posted my first post before reading the article.
'Hell's Wench' immediately took three more hits, one puncturing the right wing fuel tank to release a stream of burning aviation gasoline and another puncturing the Tokyo tanks inside to engulf the fuselage with flame. One crewman managed to leap out through the nose wheel hatch and following pilots saw his parachute open as they zipped past. Meanwhile, 'Hell's Wench' somehow managed to roar onward towards the twin stacks of the refinery.
Two minutes from target Baker's plane was a flying inferno but the intrepid pilot and his co-pilot somehow managed to remain on course. Still beyond the city, an open field lay between them and the target that would have afforded ample opportunity for a controlled crash-landing, but Baker never wavered. The two leaders jettisoned their bombs to enable them to remain airborne, then set to the task of leadership they had promised when Baker briefed his men with the words, "I'm going to take you to this one if my plane falls apart."
Even as the massive twin-stacks of Columbia Aquila loomed in his shattered cockpit window, Baker felt 'Hell's Wench' shudder beneath another direct hit. Flying as navigator for Captain Raymond Walker in 'Queenie' a short distance behind, Lieutenant Carl Barthel recalled,
"Baker had been burning for about three minutes. The right wing began to drop. I don't see how anyone could have been alive in that cockpit, but someone kept her leading the force on between the refinery stacks. Baker was a powerful man, but one man could not have held the ship on the climb she took beyond the stacks."
Baker and Jerstad tried to climb, but only after leading their men directly over the target. 'Hell's Wench' struggled to get up to 300 feet where burning crew members were seen tumbling out in a desperate attempt to parachute to earth. Meanwhile Utah Man, the sole surviving bomber in the first wave, dropped the first bombs of Tidal Wave on the massive refinery below.
Baker and Jerstad remained in the cockpit but their efforts were futile. Shortly after the bodies of their crew were seen exiting the 'Hell's Wench', the tangled wreckage of their Liberator fell over on its flaming right wing. In the plummet back to earth she missing the parallel bomber 'Queenie' by only a few feet. That bomber was piloted by Lieutenant Colonel George Brown, bringing in the second wave. "Flames hid everything in the cockpit," he marveled as he remembered the leadership of Addison Baker and his volunteer co-pilot. "Baker went down after he flew his ship to pieces to get us over the target."
None of the crew of 'Hell's Wench' survived, including the man who had leaped from the nose wheel before reaching the target.
You are correct, the mission was considered a strategic failure but with great heroism shown by most of the participants.
/johnny
Be sure to read “Freedom’s Forge: How American Business Produced Victory in World War II” by Arthur Herman. What an amazing story.
Sometimes it is a small world.
“In less than half an hour, 40 percent of Ploesti’s capacity was destroyed. But only 89 of the Liberators made it home.”
One of the young pilots, who was killed flying into and over Ploesti had family members in our church. They are gone now, but they remembered him for the decades they lived after his sacrifice.
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