Quote:
Originally Posted by Falcon Jun
While looking at further material for this thread again, I came across information that corroborates the posts revealing that further reinforcements were indeed on the way to Macarthur via Hawaii.
What really attracted my attention was that there were four more heavy bombing squadrons that had just arrived in Hawaii around Dec. 7, 1941 but were withdrawn to the US and later sent to Australia.
It seems to me that if these squadrons could still make it to Australia, why then at that point in time were they not sent instead to their original destination? For me, this indicates the thinking that the Philippine garrison was already viewed as a lost cause as early as Dec. 1941.
The US forces in the PHilippines certainly had a need to refurbish its air strength after the devastating air raids of Dec. 8 and 10. I understand the sentiment that one more soldier wouldn't have made a difference in the campaign but I just can't help but think that these squadrons could indeed have helped Macarthur hold out longer, possibly to the point when the local typhoon season starts.
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Part of those heavy bombers were the B17s that arrived over Oahu during the Japanse attack. They suffered a fair ammount of damage, delaying them as the maintiance support on Oahu for B17s was inadaquate.
More important was that their refuel stops were also under Japanese attack during the following week. Wake and Guam were both air raided and assualted by amphibious forces. Sending the bombers on to PI under those circumstances was judged a extreme risk. And, of course the news from Manila was bad, with repeated Japanese air raids rapidly destroying the airfields. Last, the essential support echelon of the bombers was sent by ship. With the fleet severely damaged sending cargo ships to Manila was judged a extreme risk.
Later those B17s flew from bases on Java in the 19th Heavy Bombardment Group. The effectiveness of these heavy bombers was 'disapointing'. The high altitude bombing techniques there were trained in proved nearly useless, and there were major problems in combined arms coordination in the Dutch and ABDA command.