First of the Many [antikvár]

FOREWORDA beachhead is the testing time of an invasion. Headlines and wirephotos and newsreels have made this clear to all Americans.In the air, back in 1942, the task of taking a beachhead in enemy territory and holding it by day was the assignment of the U.S. 8th Army Air Force.The first American "invaders" of Germany were the combat crews of the Flying Fortresses who found and smashed their targets, for many months attacking without fighter escort. Not once was any mission of the 8th, escorted or not, ever beaten back by German flak or fighters. That is the keynote of this story of the daylight air invasion of Germany and the men who carried it out.The fir St-priority target of the 8th was always the Luftwaffe. Gunners and fighter pilots of the 8th beat the Hun fighters in the air; our bombers sought out the factories that built the Luftwaffe and smashed them on the ground. The 8th paid high in casualties. But, wing-tip to wing-tip with the RAF, they brought the end of the war in Europe closer by many months. On D-Day of the second front. Hitler s first air-line of defense was a beaten air force. The invaders of the 8th had fought and died to beat itand to shrink the cost of that second front.The 8th did more than fight its own battles. It split itself to send battle-tested groups of fighters and bombers to form the 12th Air Force for the North African invasion. Out of the 12th grew the 15th, first air force to link the Allied and Russian fronts, by the mission to Russian bases in June, 1944.And one of the Fortress groups that went on that historic shuttle mission was one of the "first of the many"the same group that made the first heavy bomber attack on a German-held target, the rail yards at Rouen, France, on August 17th, 1942.Ira C. EakerLieutenant General, USA Commanding General, 8th Bomber Command, Feb. 20, 1942-Nov. 30, 1942, and of the 8th Air Force, Dec. 1, 1942-Jan. 6, 1944