WW2 Howard F 4599 Gotts US Air Force - 3

What went wrong?

Major Robert Sternfels is a veteran of Kane's 98th Bomb Group at Ploesti. He interviewed the key players later in life and has exposed serious failings. He lays the blame on Colonels Smart and Compton.

• Colonel Smart had no personal experience of bombing, or of the physical problems in handling B-24s in tight formation. The training in Libya showed that turning this huge flight of heavy aircraft and staying in or getting back into formation ready to attack was impossible, but they took no notice.
• He did no reconnaissance of the area 'so as not to alert the Germans' so they had no idea of the anti-aircraft defences. He told the pilots that there were little defences at all. (The idea that they would not strongly defend their critical oil refining providing 60% of their oil is laughable. )
• The 8 hours crossing the Mediterranean Sea and maintaining visual for 177 aircraft in all weather conditions was a huge ask.

Map is c/o this website who have analysed the raid and identified where it all went wrong.

USAF Colonel Jacob W. Smart had conceived the idea of a massive low-altitude attack launched from Benghazi, Libya. In theory flying in at treetop level made the planes difficult to track, but it relied on there being little ground defence ready to meet them.

The whole raid of 177 planes carrying 500 tons of bombs was planned to last 20 minutes. The bombs were fitted with fuses designed to go off in 45 minutes for the first bombers, to 45 seconds for the last wave to prevent them blowing up following aircraft.