"Heavy bombers to dislocate the IJN blockade of Manila Bay." Topic

Do you think and agree that an attack like this that was proposed back in 1942 would have worked in breaking the blockade by the Japanese destroyers sufficiently to resupply the US and Filipino troops on Bataan and Corregidor? Robert

Use of U.S. heavy bombers to dislocate the Japanese naval blockade of Manila Bay.

"Looks at the problem of dislocating the Japanese naval blockade from Manila Bay sufficiently to permit the entry of U.S. supply ships into Bataan and Corregidor. Concludes that the solution lies in U.S. heavy bombers from Australia to dislocate the blockade via an airstrike on the five hostile destroyers delivered shortly before the arrival of U.S. supply ships and that one squadron of heavy bombers should be sufficient to accomplish the mission."
PDF link

Somebody (probably an air corps flack) was delusional. Heavy bombers against surface ships? I think we already know how ineffectual that was.

At this point in the war, the bombers would have been lucky to hit a stationary island.
Goering promised he could supply Stalingrad too.

It's hard to make a judgement based on the sketchy information, but it looks to me like 7 destroyers and a cruiser, and if those are fleet minesweepers, that is a lot of ships to disable. the convoy must be small and with inadequate escort escort since he said even one destroyer would be fatal to the operation. Lastly, I don't think there were lots of B17s in Australia in 1942. Many were patched together older models.
Too much chance of detection, not enough time to offload, little chance of escape. Sounds very dangerous to me.

Looks like Col.Wood was a Field Artillery officer stationed on Corregidor on 25 Mar 42. Here is some information on the B-17s in Australia during that period,

19TH BOMB GROUP
IN AUSTRALIA DURING WW2
ozatwar.com/19thbg.htm

Robert

I think we already know how ineffectual that was.

At this point in the war, the bombers would have been lucky to hit a stationary island.

Yes, but *they* didn't; we employed B-17s at Midway, after all, which was 2 odd months later.

No, it wouldn't have worked. At this point in time the B-17s simply couldn't hit much at sea. They tried it, over and over again! They even tried it during the Philippines Campaign when the invasion force was just off Lingayen Gulf. In fact I can only remember one time, during 1942, with a B-17 actually hit and sunk a Japanese destroyer. The US actually captured the captain who quipped bitterly, "I guess the B-17's had to hit SOMETHING as some point. Why did it have to be MY ship?"

There just weren't that many B-17s… maybe 30+ when the war started and by March 1942 they were gone to Australia and those survivors were pretty beaten up. Sorry, it would have taken a carrier task force, or two, to punch through to Bataan and that would have been a HUGE risk.

Who is escorting the American convoy? What prevents the Japanese from detecting and sinking the convoy long before it reaches the Phillipines? We couldn't get Langley through to Java unescorted at this stage of the war, let alone Manila Bay.

One (no doubt under-strength) squadron of B-17s vs. 5 destroyers and a cruiser or two calls for each bomber to neutralize an enemy vessel, more-or-less. Ain't gonna happen. At this stage of the war USAAC was grossly optimistic about the effectiveness of low-level attacks by B-17s vs. shipping.

During the late Phillipines campain, the USAAC *did* try to operate B-17s and B-25s staging from Australia through bases on Mindanao against Japanese shipping and ground forces. The effort failed, due to: lack of aircraft and crew and poor condition of same, poor condition of the Phillipine bases and infrastructure (contrary to this author's evaluation), lack of supplies staged at those bases and, oh yeah, very effective Japanese counter-action.

At this desperate stage of the war, a number of hare-brained schemes were hatched to attempt to retrieve the looming disaster in the Pacific. Brave men tried to execute some of them. Others, like this plan, were shelved, perhaps because the resources did not exist to attempt them.

The Doolittle Raid was another such scheme. We made a propaganda victory of it, but the fact is we inflicted light damage on a few targets and lost the entire bomber squadron. We were lucky we didn't lose both carriers too.

Look, the USAAC really, really, wanted to be it's own service.
To that end, they constantly made up all sorts of ridiculous claims for what heavy high-level bombers could accomplish. They also sent tens of thousands of men to their deaths in a dubious strategic bombing campaign over Europe, to "prove" that air power could win the war. It did destroy the Luftwaffe, in an unexpected bonus side effect.

On the bright side, the plan worked and they became the USAF. Mission accomplished.

No, OP. The above plan would not have worked, not in a million years.
-Kle.

As mentioned above the actual evidence indicated a vanishing small chance of success. The B-17s at Midway accomplished nothing but causing the Japanese to maneuver some.

I do find it interesting that a Field Artillery officer wrote this. The B-17s in Europe were able to sink about 11 U-boats though during the war. So it looks like they could hit sometimes hit something on the water LOL. Robert

IIRC, bombers used against submarines were specially trained to do so, attacked from low level (often at night with radar and/or searchlights), and used depth charges. Don't think that's what AAF had in mind in the interesting document you posted.

MH

True . Though I think a couple of U-boats were sunk by the British in the same time period IIRC. Robert

Yes, Robert, the RAF Coastal Command sank a few U-boats during the war. In fact, a lot of U-boats. But thats what they were trained to do since their mission involved ASW.

Not saying they weren't coastal2. Just that they were sunk by B-17s. Robert

It probably would have been more effective to just have the B-17s drop supplies on Corregidor (not that they could have dropped very much).

I wonder how much a squadron of B-17s could drop? Robert

2 tons per aircraft, if you're talking a long flight.