The Air Force general who firebombed Japan and urged nuclear war on his adversaries
When Clay asked whether he could haul coal into Berlin, LeMay answered, 'We can haul anything.'
The architect of America's strategic bombing of Japan, whose March 1945 fire raid on Tokyo began the incineration of 66 cities. As commander of US Air Forces in Europe in 1948, he answered Lucius Clay's call during the Berlin Blockade with 'We can haul anything,' setting in motion the first phase of the Airlift. He then rebuilt Strategic Air Command into an all-jet nuclear force and, as Air Force Chief of Staff, pressed for bombing Cuba's missile sites in 1962. In retirement he ran as George Wallace's running mate in 1968.
Activities and affiliations
Career Timeline
- 1942Commander, 305th Bomb Group, European theater
- 1944–1945Led XXI Bomber Command, firebombing Japanese cities
- 1947–1948Commander, USAF Europe; launched the Berlin Airlift
- 1948–1957Commander, Strategic Air Command
- 1957–1961Vice Chief of Staff, US Air Force
- 1961–1965Chief of Staff, US Air Force
- 1968George Wallace's vice-presidential running mate
Related historical events
- 1941–1945The Pacific WarCommander of strategic bombing against JapanIn 1944–1945, he led XXI Bomber Command in firebombing Japanese cities.
- 1948–1949The Berlin Blockade and AirliftEarly commander of the airliftAs USAFE commander, he assured Clay the airlift was feasible and appointed Brig. Gen. Joseph Smith to lead the task force.
- 1950–1953The Korean WarSAC commander involved in UN operationsDuring the Korean War, he was involved in UN operations as SAC commander.
- 1962The Cuban Missile CrisisAdvocate of bombing Cuba's missile sitesDuring the 1962 Cuban crisis, he pressed for bombing the missile sites.
Strategic Air Command and the pre-emptive nuclear doctrine, 1948-1957
When LeMay took over Strategic Air Command (SAC) in 1948, it was less a real force than a collection of leftover World War II B-29 bombardment groups. Fewer than half the available aircraft were operational, crews were under-trained, and base and aircraft security standards were minimal. LeMay found a single unarmed Air Force sentry on duty in a hangar full of nuclear bombers. In a mock bombing exercise on Dayton, Ohio, most strategic bombers missed their targets by a mile or more; "We didn't have one crew, not one crew, in the entire command who could do a professional job," he recalled.
That diagnosis soon became doctrine. At a November 1948 meeting, LeMay and Air Force Chief of Staff Hoyt Vandenberg agreed that SAC's primary mission should be the capability to deliver 80 percent of the nation's atomic bombs in one mission. At the Dualism Conference that December, Air Force leadership backed LeMay's position that the service's highest priority was to deliver the SAC atomic offensive "in one fell swoop telescoping mass and time." LeMay's first SAC Emergency War Plan, delivered in March 1949, called for dropping 133 atomic bombs on 70 cities in the USSR within thirty days, and he predicted World War III would last no longer than 30 days. Air power strategists called this type of pre-emptive strike "killing a nation."
The plan met immediate rebuttal. The Harmon committee, which the Joint Chiefs of Staff had created specifically to study the effects of a massive nuclear strike on the Soviet Union, reported unanimously two months later that such an attack would not end a war with the Soviets and that their industry would quickly recover. Nevertheless, within weeks an ad hoc Joint Chiefs committee recommended tripling America's nuclear arsenal, and Vandenberg called for enough bombs to attack 220 targets, up from seventy.
LeMay received his fourth star in 1951 at age 44, becoming the youngest American four-star general since Ulysses S. Grant. He was also involved in the Korean War as SAC commander, and in a 1988 interview with U.S. Air Force historians he said that early in the war he had slipped a message to the Pentagon that SAC should be turned loose with incendiaries on some North Korean towns, only to be told there would be too many civilian casualties. "We went over there and fought the war and eventually burned down every town in North Korea anyway, some way or another, and some in South Korea, too," he said. In 1956 and 1957 he implemented tests of 24-hour bomber and tanker alerts, overseeing SAC's transformation into a modern all-jet force, and moved to Air Force Vice Chief of Staff in 1957. He was not, however, an enthusiast of the ICBM program, considering ballistic missiles little more than toys and no substitute for the strategic nuclear bomber force.