The FReeper Foxhole Remembers Operation Pointblank (1943-1944)

By 1940, with U.S. involvement in the European war imminent, American air commanders put their faith in the heavy bombers' ability to get through to bomb Adolf Hitler's Germany into submission. These leaders built an air doctrine around untested assumptions--that their bomber armadas could penetrate enemy territory without the aid of fighter escort and accurately strike German industrial targets.

In June 1941, the U.S. Army Air Corps was redesignated the U.S. Army Air Forces (USAAF) and submitted a blueprint for the defeat of the Axis powers should the United States be drawn into the war. Convinced of the effectiveness of strategic bombing, the Army Air Forces asked for and received permission to build a huge bomber force on truly a Douhetian scale. But building such an armada would take time; planes needed to be assembled, air and ground crews trained, and an air force, the Eighth, had to be positioned in England.

The British initiated their own strategic bombing campaign against Germany in late 1939. Initially, the Royal Air Force's (RAF's) Bomber Command attempted daylight strikes against the Reich, but those strikes proved disastrous, and the British soon turned to night attacks against urban centers. Throughout 1940 and 1941, the RAF continued to build up its small bomber force, and in May 1942, it conducted the first of many "thousand bomber raids" against German military, industrial and civilian targets. British Handley Page Halifax, Avro Lancaster and Vickers Wellington bombers waded through the night skies to burn Germany's cities with incendiary payloads.

British bomber raids were conducted at night to minimize aircraft losses, but the accuracy of the nocturnal strikes left much to be desired. Bomber Command was forced to carpet-bomb urban areas, a strategy that razed parts of German cities but did not effectively target Hitler's industrial complex. The British reasoned that carpet-bombing would destroy civilian morale. These night attacks continued for the remainder of the war, complementing the USAAF's daylight precision-bombing campaign by forcing Hitler to use essential resources in an attempt to save German cities from firebombing.

The newly formed Eighth Air Force, under the command of one of Arnold's premier bomber men, Maj. Gen. Ira C. Eaker, joined the RAF Bomber Command in England in the summer of 1942. When Eaker joined the Eighth Air Force, he had only a handful of B-17s in the European theater. Over the next year, the Eighth Air Force leadership struggled to build a bomber force capable of inflicting serious damage on the Germans. Once in place, the Eighth Air Force pursued a policy of high-altitude daylight precision bombing against specific target systems--aircraft factories, electric power, transportation and oil supplies--in an attempt to destroy Germany's ability to wage war.

The Allied strategic campaign in 1942 was very limited and too modest to produce conclusive evidence on its effectiveness. This was a period of apprenticeship, as bomber commanders learned tactics, trained crews and built up a ground organization. In anticipation of the invasion of North Africa--Operation Torch--units originally assigned to the Eighth Air Force were instead sent to the Mediterranean. In addition, the Eighth Air Force changed target priorities because the Allied Combined Chiefs of Staff demanded that it bomb U-boat pens and construction yards. Since most of their early targets were in France and within U.S. fighter range, the Eighth Air Force bombers had fighter support on many of their raids, and the Luftwaffe had not yet been trained to attack mass formations of B-17s.

Yet even in its limited early operations in 1942, the Eighth Air Force lost up to 7 percent of its bombers on some unescorted raids, a rate of loss that previously had led the RAF to abandon daylight operations. Such high attrition rates meant the average bomber crew could expect to survive only 14 or 15 unescorted missions. The standard tour at that time was 25 missions. If more than half the missions turned out to be unescorted, the chances of surviving an entire tour were slim.

Still, German fighters and flak continued to decimate American heavy bombers during daylight raids. General Eaker continued to believe in his bombers' ability to get through without fighter escort and bomb the Third Reich into submission. Eaker's optimism was based in part on the outrageous claims made by his aerial gunners and poor intelligence concerning the makeup of the Luftwaffe's defenses. The Eighth Air Force gunners claimed a 6-to-1 kill ratio against enemy fighters over France and the Low Countries, a vastly exaggerated figure.

Moreover, Eaker believed erroneously that the Germans had created a relatively narrow coastal fighter belt from Hamburg to Brittany. Once the bombers had punched through this fighter belt, he reasoned, there would be clear airspace the rest of the way to and from the targets. With American bomber strength continuously growing, Eaker believed his bombers would be able to get through without long-range escort.

But the Germans had not created a coastal fighter belt. Instead, the Luftwaffe had established five defensive zones, each roughly 25 miles deep, providing fighter coverage more than 100 miles inland from the coast. Instead of punching their way through a single linear defense, Allied bombers had to contend with a sophisticated defense-in-depth, which provided constant attacks against bombers going to and from their targets.

The integration of American and British bombing strategies was formalized in January 1943 at the Casablanca Conference in a directive that laid the basis for a "combined bomber offensive" in preparation for the invasion of Europe and the opening of the second front. Put into effect in June 1943, Operation Pointblank, as the combined bomber offensive was eventually called, appeared critical to any successful invasion and ground campaign, since the limited Allied ground forces would require clear air superiority and would benefit from a weakened Wehrmacht.

Operation Pointblank put German fighter strength at the top of the target list, in a category all its own. This directive, in effect, ordered the Eighth Air Force to destroy the German aviation industry and secure air superiority over the continent, but how air superiority was to be achieved was debatable. With every passing month, more Flying Fortresses and Liberators entered the pipeline, and General Eaker continued to believe his rapidly increasing flock of "self-protecting" bombers would be able to successfully reach, bomb and return from targets over the Reich itself.

Stripped of some of its bombers and fighters due to the North African campaign, Operation Pointblank opened with attacks on targets in Western Europe. Eaker placed highest priority on attacks on the German aircraft industry, especially fighter assembly plants, engine factories and ball bearing manufacturers. Petroleum targets and transportation systems dropped down the priority list, while submarine targets remained close to the top. Frustrated by erratic weather (which limited daylight raids to about 10 a month) and crew and aircraft shortages, the Eighth Air Force did not mount a very impressive effort until the summer of 1943. The ever intensifying campaign did, however, help divert about half the Luftwaffe's fighter force to anti-bomber operations. When Eaker received additional B-17 groups, he ordered major missions deep into Germany against important industrial targets, since the airfield bombings were not appreciably reducing German fighter strength.

On August 17, 1943, the Eighth Air Force launched its deepest raid against the ball bearing factories at Schweinfurt and aircraft production factories at Regensburg. The bombs destroyed some of the factory complexes, but the Luftwaffe destroyed or damaged much of the bomber force. The raids cost the Eighth Air Force 60 out of 315 bombers and usually the 10 crewmen in each bomber. After more raids against Luftwaffe airfields, the Eighth Air Force made another massive effort the next month. On September 6, Eaker sent 262 bombers against Stuttgart. Of those, 45 fell to fighters and flak. Although the Americans had proved that, weather permitting, they could put some of their bombs on target, their losses in unescorted raids suggested that the Eighth Air Force might not find planes and crews to replace its losses and maintain efficiency and morale.

Undaunted, Eaker reorganized his bomber force for another maximum effort into Germany in October 1943. Reinforced with bombers redeployed from North Africa, the Eighth Air Force once again flew unescorted into the heart of industrial Germany. The results were again disastrous. Losses in the second week of "Black October" climbed until the second major strike against the ball bearing factories at Schweinfurt capped the slaughter. On October 14, "Black Thursday," a force of 291 B-17s flew into Germany and lost 60 aircraft. Of the survivors, another 138 bombers suffered damage or casualties.

Throughout the summer and fall, Eighth Air Force bomber crews were experiencing a monthly attrition rate of 30 percent, while Luftwaffe pilots died at a rate less than half that of the Americans. Of the 35 aircrews that arrived in England with the 100th Bomb Group at the end of May 1943, only 14 percent of the men made it through the 25 missions required for rotation. The rest were dead, wounded, missing, psychological cases or prisoners of war. The message was clear: Bombers could not survive beyond the range of fighter escort. After Black Week, Eaker called off further penetrations and pondered his dilemma. The American daylight bombing campaign against Germany had reached a crisis point.

The changes eventually made to Operation Pointblank in 1944 came from several sources. Major General James H. "Jimmy" Doolittle replaced Eaker as the Eighth Air Force commander on January 6, 1944. Doolittle's experience as commander of the Northwest African Strategic Air Force during Operation Torch had convinced him of the critical importance of fighter escorts to the success of bombardment. With a fighter-escort advocate at the helm of the Eighth Air Force, the doctrine of air superiority took on greater importance. Not only would bombers continue to strike key aircraft industries, but increasing numbers of American fighter escorts would aggressively attack the Luftwaffe as the Germans rose to attack heavy bomber formations. The American fighters would also dive below 20,000 feet in search of enemy aircraft in the air and on the ground.

Building on engineering projects in 1943, the Eighth Air Force mounted wing and belly tanks on its Lockheed P-38 Lightning and Republic P-47 Thunderbolt fighters. The USAAF also discovered that by placing a British Rolls Royce Merlin engine in the North American P-51 Mustang, originally designed as a ground attack fighter-bomber, they could create the optimal long-range escort fighter for air-to-air duels with the Luftwaffe over German territory. In the meantime, the Eighth Air Force had redesigned its bomber formations for more accurate bombing and mutual self-protection.

Perhaps most significantly, Doolittle instituted a phased escort system that provided fighter coverage in relays. No longer tied to the bomber formations in fuel-wasting close support, Allied fighters were allowed by the relay system to push into enemy airspace at speed and rendezvous with bombers. Using this system, RAF Spitfires were responsible for areas over the English Channel and the North Sea to a distance of about 100 miles. American P-47 Thunderbolts then took over, providing escort for the next 150 to 200 miles. Then P-38 Lightnings took responsibility for another 100 to 150 miles, extending fighter coverage to about 450 miles. With the arrival of the first P-51Bs in England in the late fall of 1943 and the rapid development and refitting of wing and belly tanks, American bombers would enjoy escort cover to 600 miles, a range sufficient to reach Berlin.

In October 1943 the USAAF activated the Fifteenth Air Force, a strategic bomber force flying from Italy that could reach targets in south-central Germany and oil-refining targets in Eastern Europe. The activation of the Fifteenth forced the Germans to defend against two major bomber threats during daylight. Moreover, American aircraft production was finally meeting USAAF needs, and the USAAF training establishment was producing increasing numbers of bomber crews and fighter pilots. In December 1943, the Eighth Air Force mounted its first 600-plane raid. On January 1, 1944, the U.S. Strategic Air Forces, under the command of Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, came into existence to coordinate the Eighth and Fifteenth air forces' raids.

By early 1944, the newly formed U.S. Strategic Air Forces was hastening the destruction of the Luftwaffe in the air and on the ground, as well as carrying out the selective destruction of German industrial power. Spaatz abandoned his predecessor's belief that the heavy bombers would always get through and championed the use of fighter escorts for bombers attacking deep into German territory.

The U.S. Strategic Air Forces, coordinating Eighth and Fifteenth air forces' raids, resulted in a new peak in the American bombing effort. Testing all its reforms in early February 1944, the Eighth Air Force mounted a third Schweinfurt raid and lost only 11 out of 231 bombers, while three other raids sent 600 bombers against Germany with minimal losses. The USAAF mounted some 3,800 daylight sorties over the Reich during the so-called Big Week of February 22-25, while more than 2,300 night sorties were flown by RAF Bomber Command. Although Big Week cost the Eighth 300 planes (mostly bombers) lost or written off, nearly 10,000 tons of bombs were dropped on the German aircraft industry and ball bearing plants, a greater tonnage than the Eighth had dropped on all targets in 1943. As many as 1,000 complete or nearly complete German aircraft had been destroyed.

Additional Sources:

www.brooksart.com
www.wpafb.af.mil

With fighters that could fly beyond the Rhine, protect bomber formations and sweep ahead to engage the Luftwaffe interceptors, the Eighth Air Force formations reversed the loss ratio with the German fighter force. American bomber losses fell below 10 percent of each raiding force, while German pilot losses mounted. In February 1944 alone, the Luftwaffe lost 33 percent of its single-engine fighters and 20 percent of its fighter pilots, including several fliers who were credited with more than 100 victories. In the first four months of 1944 it had lost 1,684 fighter pilots. Their replacements would be unskilled youths thrust into combat against experienced American pilots.

Compounding Germany's troubles, the Americans had begun to introduce new fighters into the European theater in the fall of 1943, which continued throughout the war. They included Thunderbolts, Mustangs and Lightnings, which were joined by British Spitfires and Hawker Tempests. During the first six months of 1944, the air battle over occupied Europe continued with unabated ferocity. A primary goal of Operation Pointblank was fulfilled when, on June 6, 1944, the Luftwaffe failed to menace Operation Overlord, the Normandy invasion, and the Allies enjoyed air superiority over the battlefield for the rest of the war. The success of Operation Overlord was in no small part due to the air war waged over the Continent between January and June 1944.

Meanwhile, the remnants of the Luftwaffe battled the RAF and USAAF as the round-the-clock pounding of German cities and industry continued. Allied heavy bombers over the Reich now served as both bait and hunter, compelling the Luftwaffe to climb above 20,000 feet to meet the oncoming bombers and their deadly escorts in order to defend important industrial and population centers. The German planes then became targets for the well-trained Mustang and Thunderbolt pilots.

By the time Operation Pointblank ended, it had achieved its primary objective, securing air superiority over the cities, factories and battlefields of Western Europe in preparation for Overlord. Operation Pointblank had succeeded, but not in the way Allied planners had initially intended or expected. Round-the-clock bombing had not smashed the Luftwaffe into oblivion, nor had it destroyed German aircraft production. Instead, by simultaneously striking at aircraft factories and bombing industrial and military targets deep inside Germany, the combined bomber offensive forced the Luftwaffe to send its fighters to meet the ever-increasing flow of bombers over the Reich. Once in the air, they were assailed by Allied fighter escorts. In this war of attrition, the Luftwaffe lost its greatest asset--its experienced pilots. Without skilled pilots to meet the Allied threat, the rise in German aircraft production meant nothing.

The American doctrine of strategic daylight precision bombing failed because it rested on three premises that would be tested in World War II. The first premise centered on a belief of Arnold and his bomber disciples that their heavy bombers would "always get through" without escort and destroy or neutralize enemy industry. The B-17s and B-24s were not able to adequately fight their way in and establish local command of the air. Instead, the Luftwaffe exploited the weaknesses of the flying armadas, inflicting heavy losses on the bombers--losses so extreme that, after Black Week, strategic bombing was suspended until the emergence of a new air strategy.

Second, supporters of strategic daylight precision bombing believed erroneously that the civilian population was the weak link in a nation's defense. It was thought that bringing the horrors of war directly to the factories, power plants and railroads in the cities would cause the citizens of an enemy nation to compel their government to sue for peace. In practice, neither the morale nor the will of the bombed populations approached collapse.

The third premise was the belief that strategic bombing could eliminate an enemy's ability to wage war by destroying its industrial base. German industrial output was not stopped by Allied strategic bombing. Legions of laborers ensured adequate manpower, while the largest machine-tool industry in the world compensated for the damage done to machinery. Germany had sufficient industrial capacity to absorb the first years of Allied strategic bombing. Dispersal of industry, ongoing repair and expansion compensated for additional bombing losses. In spite of the Allied strategic bombing campaign, the German economy continued to expand until late in the war.

As the American strategic campaign entered its second year, it faced an experienced and determined foe in the Luftwaffe. By 1943, when American bombers began to invade the airspace of the Reich proper, the Luftwaffe fighter command began to make a major effort against them. American losses from both England and North Africa mounted inexorably from August to October, culminating in the Eighth Air Force's so-called Black Week. The week as a whole cost the Eighth Air Force a quarter of its airmen in England. After Black Week, the Americans effectively suspended daylight raids over the Reich until February 1944.

With U.S. bombers experiencing greater and greater attrition rates, American air commanders desperately sought a solution to their failing strategic-bombing campaign. A solution came with a change of emphasis in air doctrine. The changes produced a revision of Operation Pointblank and a doctrine that emphasized destroying the Luftwaffe in a war of attrition in order to gain air superiority for the coming D-Day invasion in the summer of 1944. The revised Operation Pointblank gave the Allies air superiority for D-Day and virtual command of the air for the push toward Berlin.

Operation Pointblank was a success. Local air superiority belonged to the Allies for the opening of the second front. The war for air superiority over Western Europe had been won, but not by "self-defending" heavy bombers. It had been won by a combination of fighters actively hunting down and killing Germany's air force and Allied bombers damaging the industrial and logistical infrastructure that supported the German military machine's ability to make war. In this two-pronged strategy, both bombers and fighters had a crucial, symbiotic role. American air commanders, like their ground counterparts before them, finally realized the truth of German strategist Carl von Clausewitz's statement--that victory in war comes, first and foremost, through the destruction of the enemy's armed forces. Operation Pointblank proved that American air power's first mission should always be the establishment of air superiority through the destruction of the enemy's air force.

Veterans for Constitution Restoration is a non-profit, non-partisan educational and grassroots activist organization. The primary area of concern to all VetsCoR members is that our national and local educational systems fall short in teaching students and all American citizens the history and underlying principles on which our Constitutional republic-based system of self-government was founded. VetsCoR members are also very concerned that the Federal government long ago over-stepped its limited authority as clearly specified in the United States Constitution, as well as the Founding Fathers' supporting letters, essays, and other public documents.

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We here at Blue Stars For A Safe Return are working hard to honor all of our military, past and present, and their families. Inlcuding the veterans, and POW/MIA's. I feel that not enough is done to recognize the past efforts of the veterans, and remember those who have never been found.

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UPDATED THROUGH APRIL 2004

The FReeper Foxhole. America's History. America's Soul

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Great story

Something not so great.

Stout says no to ROTC discrimination (Wi.)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1408497/posts

Good morning Snippy.

Good morning, Snippy and everyone at the Freeper Foxhole.

Good morning

May 23, 2005

"I Will Be Good"

Read:
1 Samuel 15:10-23

Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? -1 Samuel 15:19

Bible In One Year: Psalm 127-129

cover When Queen Victoria was a child, she didn't realize that she was in line for the throne of England. Her instructors, trying to prepare her for the future, were frustrated because they couldn't motivate her. She just didn't take her studies seriously. Finally, her teachers decided to tell her that one day she would become the queen of England. Upon hearing this, Victoria quietly said, "Then I will be good." The realization that she had inherited this high calling gave her a sense of responsibility that profoundly affected her conduct from that day forward.

Our Scripture reading for today tells how Saul had been chosen from among the people of Israel as their anointed king (1 Samuel 15:17). Almighty God had honored him greatly in giving him this position as leader of His special nation. But Saul didn't think about the kind of attitude that should accompany his high calling. If he had, he would not have pounced on the loot of battle as if he were the leader of an outlaw band (v.19).

As believers, we are children of God and joint-heirs with Christ (Romans 8:16-17). We have a noble calling. Let's always keep in mind who we are. This will help us to say, as young Victoria said, "I will be good." -Herb Vander Lugt

O Lord, you see what's in my heart,
There's nothing hid from You;
So help me live the kind of life
That's honest, good, and true. -D. De Haan

A child of the King will want to display the manners of the court.

FOR FURTHER STUDY
How Do You Live The Christian Life?

Off to Jury Duty Bump for an interesting Foxhole.

See the book "Winged Victroy' by Geoffry Pearrault(sp) for a fascinating histroy of the AAF from WW-I to WW-II

Regards

alfa6 ;>}

Hi SAM, Snip,
As we have discussed previously, fighters using visual means can only rarely even find enemy bombers, and after the bombers are found fighters must make a "stern chase", that is, pursue and catch up to the bombers before attacking. Fighters have a limited time in the air and in those days could use up one half of their fuel and half an hour getting to 25,000 feet. Calculation shows that Eaker was correct - except for radar. The "bombers always get through" was true in 1935 but not in 1939.

Douhet was largely correct in his analysis, I think. First, he died in 1928, long before radar. Second, one half of the weight dropped was to be mustard gas, the remainder high explosive and incendiary. Looks to me that 200 tons of that load per square mile would make things pretty ugly on the ground. That is twenty Lancasters a square mile. Targeting would only mean finding the city getting the present. Repeat this often enough and decontamination efforts would likely be abandoned. If you figure that Germany had 400 square miles of suitable targets then 8,000 Lancaster sorties a month would do it. Would need about 500 airplanes available for each night's work.

Would have been nasty, but nothing compared to N, the Anglo-American anthrax bombing project.

If you divide the total tonnage of Eighth Air Force bombs dropped on Germany by the number of American human casualties you will get a shocking number. Looks to me like four tons per American death. Much worse in the early days. Tons of bombs dropped per bomber lost is maybe thirty tons including milk runs. Need to find higher quality numbers. A rough game though, for sure.

Good morning ladies. Flag-o-Gram.

On this Day In History

Birthdates which occurred on May 23:
1598 Claude Mellan French engraver/cartoonist/painter, baptized
1707 Carolus Linnæus Swedish botanist/"Father of Taxonomy"
1718 William Hunter obstetrician/medal writer
1734 Friedrich Anton Mesmer Austria, physician/hypnotist (Mesmerism)
1753 Giovanni Battista Viotti violonist/composer
1810 Margaret Fuller writer/critic 1st pro book review column (New York Tribune)
1813 Mason Brayman Brevet Major General (Union volunteers), died in 1895
1820 James Buchanan Eads US, engineer/inventor (Eads Bridge-St Louis)
1824 Ambrose Everett Burnside Major General (Union volunteers)
1828 Edward Hitchcock America's 1st professor of physical ed (Amherst College)
1837 James Sanks Brisbin Brevet Major General (Union volunteers), died in 1892
1844 'Abdu'l-Bahá early Bahá'í leader
1848 Helmuth J L von Moltke German general/chief of staff (WWI)
1848 Otto Lilienthal pioneer aviator
1849 Károly earl Khuen-Héderváry Premier of Hungary (1910-12)
1866 Gustav Aschaffenburg German psychiatrist/criminalologist
1883 Douglas Fairbanks Denver CO, actor (Zorro/3 Musketeers/Robin Hood)
1890 Herbert Marshall London, actor (Murder, Razor's Edge, Little Foxes)
1890 Virginia Eames Fort Davis TX, entertainer
1903 Walter Reisch US, screenwriter (Ninotchka, Gaslight, Titanic)
1908 Christian GK Baëta Togolese chairman (International Mission Council)
1908 John Bardeen US, physicist (transistor, Nobel 1956, 1972)
1910 Artie Shaw [Arthur Jacob Arshawsky] New York NY, bandleader (Come'on my House)
1910 Franz Jozef Kline US expressionist painter
1910 Scatman Crothers [Benjamin], Terre Haute IN, actor (Zapped, Shining)
1915 Clyde Wiegand physicist
1920 Helen O'Connell Lima OH, singer (Green Eyes, Amapola)
1921 Humphrey Lyttelton jazz musician/actor (It's Great to Be Young)
1921 James [Benjamin] Blish US/UK, sci-fi author (Hugo, Star Trek Reader)
1928 Rosemary Clooney Maysville KY, singer
1931 Barbara Barrie Chicago IL, actress (Breaking Away, Barney Miller)
1933 Bruce A Peterson US test pilot (M2, HL-10)
1934 Robert Moog inventor (the Moog Synthesizer)
1945 Lauren Chapin actress (Kathy-Father Knows Best)
1950 Linda Thompson Memphis TN, actress (Hee Haw)
1951 Anatoliy Karpov USSR, world chess champion (1975-85)
1954 "Marvelous" Marvin Hagler New Jersey, middleweight boxing champion (1982-83)
1958 Thomas Reiter Germany, cosmonaut (Soyuz TM-22)
1961 Drew Carey Cleveland OH, actor/comedian (Drew-Drew Carey Show)
1973 Verna Vasquez Miss Universe-best swimsuit (Curacao, 1997)
1974 Jewel [Kilcher] St George UT, folk/rock vocalist (Pieces of You)

Deaths which occurred on May 23:
1125 Hendrik V Roman catholics German king/emperor (1098/1111-25), dies
1153 David I king of Scotland (1124-53), dies at about 68
1423 Benedict XIII [Pedro the Luna] Spanish Pope (1394-1423), dies
1498 Girolamo Savonarola dictator of Florence (1494-98), tortured & executed in Florence at 45
1701 William Kidd Scottish pirate, hanged at London's Execution Dock
1841 Franz Xaver von Baader German philosopher/theologist, dies at 76
1881 Kit Carson frontiersman, dies
1895 Franz E Neumann German mineralogist/physicist, dies at 96
1906 Henrik Johan Ibsen Norwegian playwright (Doll House), dies at 78
1934 Bonnie & Clyde bank robbers killed in shoot-out with police in Shreveport LA
1937 John Davison Rockfeller industrialist, dies at 97 in Ormond Beach FL
1941 Lord Herbert Austin motor manufacturer, dies
1945 Heinrich Himmler Nazi/Gestapo leader, commits suicide while in prison at Luneburg, Germany at 44
1960 Georges Claude engineer/inventor, dies
1968 James Burke actor (Ellery Queen, Army Surgeon), dies at 81
1969 Jimmy McHugh composer (Can't Give You Anything But Love), dies at 74
1975 Jackie "Moms" Mabley comedienne (Amazing Grace), dies at 81
1982 Louis J N Gérardin bicyclist (world champion sprint 1930), dies at 69
1986 Sterling Hayden actor (Blue & Gray), dies at 70
1992 Giovanni Falcone anti-mafia judge (Palermo), murdered
1994 Joe Pass US jazz guitarist (The Trio), dies at 65
1999 Owen Hart (33), a professional wrestler also known as "The Blue Blazer," dies
2002 "Slammin" Sam Snead (89), golfing legend, died.

GWOT Casualties

Iraq
23-May-2004 2 | US: 2 | UK: 0 | Other: 0
US Specialist Jeremy L. Ridlen Fallujah Hostile - hostile fire - IED attack
US Staff Sergeant Jorge A. Molina Bautista Fallujah Hostile - hostile fire - IED attack

Afghanistan
A Good Day

http://icasualties.org/oif/
Data research by Pat Kneisler
Designed and maintained by Michael White

On this day...
1059 Henri I crowns his son King Philip I of France
1275 King Edward I of England orders cessation of persecution of French Jews
1421 Jews of Austria imprisoned & expelled
1430 Joan of Arc captured by Burgundians at Compiegne, who sell her to the British
1533 King Henry VIII & Catherine of Aragon marriage declared null & void
1536 Pope Paul III installs Portugese inquisition
1568 Battle at Heiligerlee: Dutch rebels beat Spanish, 100s killed
1576 Tycho Brahe given Hveen Island to build Uraniborg Observatory
1618 2nd Defenestration of Prague; the beginning of the 30 Years War
1618 Imperial civil servants thrown out a window of Prague Castle
1667 King Afonso VI of Portugal flees
1701 Captain Kidd hung in London after conviction of piracy & murder
1706 Battle of Ramillies: Marlborough defeats the French 17,000 were killed.
1774 Chestertown tea party occurs (tea dumped into Chester River)
1779 Benedict Arnold, military governor of Philadelphia, wrote a query to the British asking what they would pay for his services.
1785 Benjamin Franklin announces his invention of bifocals
1788 South Carolina becomes 8th state to ratify US constitution
1844 Declaration of the Báb (Bahá'í festival) ('Azamat 7, 1)
1853 Buenos Aires gains independence from Argentina (reunited 1859)
1861 3 fleeing slaves enter Fort Monroe VA
1861 Virginia citizens vote 3 to 1 in favor of secession
1862 Battle at Front Royal VA
1862 Valley Campaign-Stonewall Jackson takes Front Royal VA
1864 Battle of Dallas GA
1864 Battle of North Anna VA, 1st of 3 days of fighting
1865 Flag flown at full staff over White House, 1st time since Lincoln shot
1865 Grand Review begins in Washington DC
1867 Jesse James-gang rob bank in Richmond MO (2 die, $4,000 taken)
1873 1st Preakness: G Barbee aboard Survivor wins in 2:43
1873 Canada's North West Mounted Police Force (RCMPF) forms
1873 Postal cards sold in San Fransisco for 1st time
1876 1st National League no-hitter (Joe Borden, Boston)
1882 6" of snow falls in eastern Iowa
1883 Baseball game between one-armed and one-legged players
1887 1st transcontinental train arrives in Vancouver British Columbia
1894 William Love hosts ground breaking ceremonies for Love Canal
1898 1st Philippine Expeditionary Troops sail from San Fransisco
1901 Indians score 9 runs after 2 outs in 9th to beat Senators 14-13
1901 US captures leader of Philippine rebels, Emilio Aguinaldo
1903 Dr. Horatio N. Jackson set off to cross the US from San Francisco in his $2,500 Winton touring car with his mechanic Sewell Croker. They reached NYC July 26.
1903 1st direct primary election law in US adopted, by Wisconsin
1908 Dirigible explodes over San Fransisco Bay, 16 passengers fall, none die
1908 Part of the Great White Fleet arrives in Puget Sound WA
1911 New York Public Library building at 5th Avenue dedicated by President Taft
1915 Italy declares war on Austria-Hungary & Germany during WWI
1916 Heavy battles at Fort Douaumont Verdun
1920 Pope Benedictus XV publishes encyclical Pacem Dei
1922 "Abie's Irish Rose" 1st of over 2,500 performances
1922 Harry Greb gives Gene Tunney his only professional boxing defeat
1922 Walt Disney incorporates his 1st film company Laugh-O-Gram Films
1926 Hack Wilson is 1st to hit a homerun off Wrigley Field scoreboard
1926 Lebanese constitution is established under French mandate
1931 Whipsnade Zoo opens in Whipsnade Beds England
1932 Sir Hubert Ferdinand Opperman sets 24 hour record of 860 miles, 367 yards
1934 Wallace Carothers manufactures 1st nylon (polymeer 66)
1935 1st scheduled night game, postponed due to rain (Cincinnati)
1939 British decoration, George Cross, 1st presented
1939 British parliament plans to make Palestine independent by 1949
1939 Dmitri Shostakovich appointed professor at conservatory of Leningrad
1939 Hitler proclaims he wants to move into Poland
1939 Submarine Squalis sinks off Portsmouth NH, (A diving bell designed by Charles "Swede" Momsen (d.1967) brought 33 survivors (26 perished) safely to the surface.)
1941 Joe Louis beats Buddy Baer on DQ in 7 for heavyweight boxing title
1943 826 Allied bombers attack Dortmund
1944 Operation-Buffalo: Allied jailbreak out Anzio-bridgehead
1944 Polo Grounds host 1st NYC night game since 1941
1945 British military police arrest Admiral Karl Doenitz
1945 Heinrich Himmler, German Nazi leader & Chief of Police, committed suicide
1945 Lord Haw-Haw arrested at Danish boundary
1945 Winston Churchill resigns as British PM
1948 Joe DiMaggio hits 3 consecutive homeruns
1948 Ramat Rahel gateway to Jerusalem is repossessed by Israel
1949 Federal Republic of [West] Germany proclaimed (Republic Day)
1953 Schools 1st use Cliff's Notes
1953 WHIZ TV channel 18 in Zanesville OH (NBC/ABC) begins broadcasting
1956 Presbyterian Church begins accepting women ministers
1958 Mao Tse Tung starts "Great leap forward" movement in China. 30 million people by the end of 1960 in resulting famine

1960 Israel announced capture of Nazi Adolf Eichmann in Argentina

1962 Joe Pepitone 2nd Yankee to hit 2 homeruns in 1 inning (Joe DiMaggio)
1962 OAS leader General Raoul Salan sentenced to life
1962 Scott Carpenter orbits Earth 3 times in US Aurora 7
1963 NBC purchases 1963 AFL championship game TV rights for $926,000
1966 The Beatles release "Paperback Writer"
1969 BBC orders 13 episodes of Monty Python's Flying Circus (And now for something completely different, a man with two buttocks)
1969 The Who release the rock opera "Tommy"
1971 Rock group Iron Butterfly disbands
1974 Italian Red Brigade officer Mario Sossi freed
1977 Moluccan extremists hold 105 schoolchildren & 50 others hostage on a hijacked train in Netherlands, children released May 27, siege ends June 11
1977 Supreme Court refuses to hear appeals of Watergate wrong doers H R Halderman, John Ehrlichman & John Mitchell
1981 Barcelona fascists take 200 people hostage
1981 NASA launches Intelsat V
1982 BBC warns Britain will bomb Argentina
1982 Pope John Paul II declares "Peerke" Donders divine
1983 Radio Moscow announcer Vladimir Danchev praises Afghánistán Muslims standing up to Russia; he is removed from the air
1988 Maryland stops sale of cheap pistols on Jan 1, 1990
1989 Angela Visser, 22, of Holland, crowned 38th Miss Universe
1990 Clinton’s campaign for a 5th term as governor of Arkansas received a $60,000 loan from the Perry County Bank. More cash was requested a few days later
1990 Cost of rescuing savings & loan failures is put at up to $130 billion
1990 New York Yankees hit 6 homeruns to beat Minnesota Twins 12-0
1991 Last Cubans troops leave Angola
1991 US Supreme Court bars subsidized clinics from discussing abortion
1992 President Bush orders Coast Guard to intercept boats with Haitian refugees
1994 Star Trek The Next Generation, finale airs this week in syndication
1994 Four men convicted in the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center were each sentenced to 240 years in prison.
1995 A man with an unloaded handgun climbed over a fence and ran toward the White House. He was tackled by one Secret Service agent and shot and wounded by a second.
1996 Federal agents in the Bay Area and Sacramento, Ca., began arresting agents of China’s two main government-owned arms companies on suspicion of smuggling 2,000 illegal automatic assault weapons into the US. The smugglers are representatives of China Northern Industrial Corp. (Norinco) and Poly Technologies. Norinco reports to the State Council headed by Premier Li Peng. Poly Tech operates under the Chinese army General Staff, which reports to Chinese Pres. Jiang Zemin.
1997 Iranians elected a "moderate" president, Mohammad Khatami, who favored improved economic ties with the West, over hard-liners in the ruling Muslim clergy.

Holidays
Note: Some Holidays are only applicable on a given "day of the week"

Bermuda : Empire Day
German Federal Republic : Republic Day (1949)
Jamaica : Labour Day
Rye, Sussex England : Mayoring Day
South Carolina : Ratification Day (1788)
Bifocals Birthday
Don't Rob a Bank Day
American Japan Week Begins
National Salad Month

Religious Observances
Christ : Feast of St Ives of Chartres, patron of lawyers (or 0519?)
Bahá'í : Declaration of Bab (festival) ('Azamat 7, 1)
Christian : Solemnity of Pentecost (Whitsunday)
Christian-Scotland : Term Day
Feast of St. Desiderius, Bishop and martyr.

Religious History
1633 By French edict, only Catholic settlers were permitted permanent residence within the country known as New France (called "Canada" today), thus ending 30 years of attempted colonization by Huguenots (Protestants).
1862 Birth of Hermann Gunkel, the German Protestant biblical scholar who pioneered the analytical approach to understanding Scripture afterward known as "form criticism." Gunkel applied its formulas primarily to the Old Testament, in his commentaries on Genesis (1901) and on the Psalms (1926-28).
1889 Birth of Mary Susanne Edgar, a Canadian YWCA leader who wrote a number of hymns during her years of leading a Christian camping ministry with girls. Her best-remembered hymn: "God, Who Touchest Earth with Beauty."
1903 Death of American Congregational missionary Henry Blodget, 78. He served 40 years in China (1854-94), and helped translate the New Testament into the colloquial Mandarin language of Peking.
1926 Birth of Wilbur Nelson, Christian broadcast personality and for many years the host of "The Morning Chapel Hour," a radio ministry originating in Paramount, California.

Source: William D. Blake. ALMANAC OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1987.

Thought for the day :
"Man is not made for society, but society is made for man. No institution can be good which does not tend to improve the individual."

For the reading list:"Clash of Wings"[A general history of the air war], by Walter J. Boyne; "To Command the Sky" [Air Ops over Germany 1942-1944], by McFarland and Newton]; "Double Strike" [Regensburg/Schweinfurt Raid] by Edward Jablonski

Good morning everyone.

uh-oh, Can't see the 'gram.

ahha! there it is! Good one, reminds me of bittygirl and elfboy.. er, superboy.

Morning, PE. Swell Flag-0-gram today, love those kids.

Morning Snippy.

A week of nice weather coming :-)

"I Will Be Good"

Read:1 Samuel 15:10-23

Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? -1 Samuel 15:19

Bible In One Year: Psalm 127-129

Read:
1 Samuel 15:10-23