Curtis LeMay: Bombing To Win

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“Whatever other names arise,” Barrett Tillman writes in “LeMay: A Biography” (Palgrave, 224 pages, $21.95), General Curtis LeMay and Admiral Chester Nimitz “were the two commanders most responsible for defeating the Japanese Empire.” Nimitz rebuilt the Navy after Pearl Harbor and at Midway delivered a blow to the Japanese carrier force from which it could never recover. Similarly, LeMay took the air battle to the Japanese homeland, perfecting the B29 on bombing missions that may well have won the war even without the atomic bomb.

Not that LeMay opposed the bomb. He was certain it would shorten the war and minimize the huge losses an American invasion of the Japanese homeland would entail. Indeed, World War II confirmed LeMay’s military doctrine of stipulating the use of maximum, overwhelming force to defeat an enemy. He deplored the gradual escalation of firepower in Korea and Vietnam, and as soon as he heard of plans for the Bay of Pigs invasion, he pronounced the invasion force doomed, especially when air cover was withdrawn, leaving the invaders easy targets for Castro’s army.

LeMay was the quintessential Cold Warrior who gave no quarter. He was called a Neanderthal because he favored a first strike against the Soviet Union. But to LeMay it made no sense to absorb the deaths of millions of Americans and then retaliate. LeMay never challenged civilian leaders in public, but when Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara asked LeMay’s opinion, McNamara got a direct assessment of the worthlessness of his own notions of flexible response.

As Mr. Tillman explains, LeMay did his public image no good by running for vice president on George Wallace’s ticket in 1968. LeMay was never a racist — indeed he had served in an Army air force that had desegregated before Brown vs. Board mandated integration in schools. But LeMay distrusted Richard Nixon, who in the general’s view had no viable plan (secret or otherwise) to end the Vietnam war. LeMay also spurned Hubert Humphrey, who was tainted by President Johnson’s bollixed war strategy. Wallace at least spoke with a bluntness that LeMay admired, although Mr. Tillman does not explore the relationship between the two men (perhaps because there was not much of one to discuss).

Mr. Tillman finds much to admire in LeMay, a general who led his own bomber missions and was more familiar with flying equipment than his own men. No one perfected the art of putting planes on their targets and bringing crews safely home better than he. LeMay listened to his airmen, openly inviting their criticism and suggestions. His crews were accountable to him, and were summarily dismissed for incompetence or failure. But LeMay also granted promotions on the spot for outstanding work. He was just as good at follow-up, revoking those promotions when men did not perform at the higher level required by their new ranks.

LeMay the man remains something of a mystery. Mr. Tillman rarely mentions LeMay’s wife or family. Discussing how the general felt about the firebombing of Tokyo, for example, Mr. Tillman is at a loss. The best he can say is that LeMay “compartmentalized” events and did not dwell on the thousands his bombs annihilated. That LeMay was not unfeeling is apparent in the many visits he paid to his wounded airmen, and in the number of decorations he awarded them.

Although LeMay published books about his career, he never attempted to rehabilitate himself or rationalize his decisions. He despised politics, and only engaged in them when he needed planes and equipment. His record as the organizer of the Strategic Air Command, and his ability to acquire the resources it needed, were unparalleled. As a military man, he embraced and developed new technologies, welcoming, for example, guided missiles as integral to his bomber force.

But LeMay’s decision to run with Wallace suggests that for all his contempt for politics he wanted to make yet another contribution to American life. What was it? And why did he choose to ally himself with such an inflammatory figure? These questions Mr. Tillman hardly poses, let alone answers. I wish he had done more interviewing. His notes indicate he spoke and e-mailed with a handful of military men who knew LeMay well. Perhaps LeMay the man is as elusive as he seems in Mr. Tillman’s book, but I’d like to see another writer take a crack at a full-blown biography.

crollyson@nysun.com


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