bat training on the Lorraine front in the Toul sector. Brigade strength ran to about 1600 men, and each squadron, if fully equipped, would have 24 airplanes. All were short. The 1st Pursuit Group brought 52 obsolescent Nieuport-28's with its four squadrons into the sector on 27 June, where after a few days it was assigned as the organic pursuit group of Hq Sixth Army. The 1st Observation Group had only three squadrons. One was assigned to Liggett's headquarters, and the others were to work with the two divisions he had on line. The 1st Brigade headquarters receded into an administrative support role.72

Two edifying patterns with regard to air operations were offered by the play against ReimsMarneschutz. One appeared in its prompt, decisive containment by a well-set defense made possible for Pétain by sound intelligence. The other could be found in the battle waged at the Marne crossings in emergency by the centrally commanded tactical air forces: the Division Aérienne and the IX Air Brigade.

East of Reims the alerted defense of the Fourth Army over long-organized ground dealt so severely with the Crown Prince's Third and First Armies that by noon of the second day Ludendorff suspended their attacks. West of Reims the Seventh Army won its way across the Marne and five kilometers deep into the newer French front before coming up against a restored resistance that could be overcome only by passing a large number of batteries over the river.73

During the early morning hours of 15 July while the German preparation fire thundered over the front, the pioneers of General von Boehn's Seventh Army pushed bridges and boats across the river and the advance assault troops double-timed or were ferried to the French bank. Soon after dawn the battle topped the high ground south of the stream. Before III Corps the main line of resistance was overrun. Many of the corps batteries were lost and the remainder forced to retreat, so that the German pontoon bridges could not be taken under artillery fire for several critical hours during the day. North of the river the V Corps and the Italian I Corps were dangerously attacked and driven back.74

The air battle of 15 July developed in two operational theaters, corresponding to the bifurcated German offensive. East of Reims the two

pursuit groups organic to the French Fourth Army had been reinforced by the three groupes de chasse of Escadre No. 1, Division Aérienne. Against fairly strong enemy activity, which grew stronger in the afternoon, command of the air at this front was held throughout the day. West of Reims the fight was bitterly pressed home by large flights of enemy pursuit, including the latest Fokker D-7's of the Jagdgeschwader No. 1 and No. 3. Fifth Army had one organic pursuit group, which was committed to the defense of the army's left front, but in vain. During the morning the German fighters cruised the Fifth Army positions in strength, paralyzing the observation aviation and holding the Fifth Army commander in ignorance of the movements crumbling his left. At the Sixth Army right the small force of the U.S. 1st Pursuit Group was inadequate to break the German barrage patrol for the corps observation flights. The Schlachtstaffeln swept into the battle, gunning the troops until the U.S. 3d Division complained emphatically about the "absence" of friendly fight

The three groupes de chasse of Escadre No. 2, Division Aérienne, were in position to back up the Fifth and Sixth Army fighters, but a battle of the utmost urgency developed at the enemy bridges over the Marne. There at 0530 the German storm troops had driven the III Corps from its main line of resistance. By 0600 columns of German infantry were pouring over the bridges on the double without intervention of artillery. By 0800 reports came of six bridges free from fire. V Corps, recoiling at Fifth Army left, had also lost the support of its artillery. By 1000 the enemy pocket was five to six kilometers deep along a front of 14 kilometers below the Marne. Group Army Center could bring no fire to bear against the massed river crossings but that of the Division Aérienne.76

Escadre No. 2 of the 2d Brigade had been alerted at the point of day to work its three groupes de chasse in liaison with the Fifth and Sixth Armies, their principal mission "to machine-gun the troops on the passages of the Marne." At 0800 the 2d Brigade Command Post had an order by telephone. "Delay enemy columns south of the Marne not only with your bombardiers but with your machine gunners." At 0850 Escadre No. 13 was alerted by brigade to bomb the Marne passages and enemy concentrations near Dormans. About 1000 hours

52 Bréguet-14B two-place day bombers took off in the two groups of Escadre No. 13.

During the early morning of 15 July the ceiling was very low over the Marne valley and haze thickened the air. As the day wore on, the cloud cover became broken, and after noon the sky was generally clear. Escadre No. 13 found a ceiling of 600 meters over target, but only one flight could break into the clear to bomb, releasing little more than a ton (metric) of bombs. Escadre No. 12 of the 1st Brigade, also alerted at 0850 for the same objectives, succeeded magnificently despite strong defense of the Marne pocket by German pursuit. Ninety-eight planes of the three groups took off, dropped 17 metric tons of bombs, cut two bridges, fired 6000 rounds at ground targets, and strongly disrupted troop concentrations on both sides of the

river.

About 1130 hours the last elements of the Division Aérienne bombardment forces withdrew. But from 1100 to 1300 hours the IX Air Brigade took over at the Marne in force of 36 aircraft that dropped 47 bombs and fired another 6000 rounds upon columns and assemblies waiting to pass over the river. At 1400 hours Escadre 12 took off again, with 102 sorties, and again successfully performed its mission, for all the strong formations of enemy fighters now patrolling the target area. Eighteen tons of bombs were dropped, cutting one of the footbridges among the plentiful targets at the jammed crossings. About 1500 hours the artillery line was re-established, and shells began to fall upon the bridges and bridgeheads while the French bombardiers still worked their targets. At 1800 hours Escadre 13 took off again. This time the wing found its targets uncovered and put 5.65 tons of bombs into the objective areas."

The measure of this day's work by the Division Aérienne and the IX Brigade was not in the number of tons of bombs dropped or cartridges fired, nor in the three bridges knocked down of the 13 that had been thrown across the river, difficult targets then as now. The results of the air battle of the Marne crossings were felt in the delay and the confusion laid upon the German exploitation of initial success. The columns that had to be rammed through the choke points were under attack or expecting attack almost constantly throughout the critical hours when the defenders' guns were silent and the time was ripe to pour troops and guns

across the river where the line of resistance dissolved and reserves had yet to come up.

On the 16th von Boehn's attack was spent. His divisions south of the Marne were meeting counterattacks, and at 1945 hours the Headquarters Army Group Imperial Crown Prince ordered him to stand there on defense. Only north of the river would he continue to attack.78 Maistre had been able this day to concentrate massive air forces against the Seventh Army. During the preceding night the Groupement Chabert continued the bombing of the Marne passages west of Verneuil. At dawn the IX Brigade and all but one pursuit group of the Division Aérienne were directed against von Boehn's struggle to strengthen his attack fronts. The Groupement Bloch surveyed the front for troop concentrations or new bridges. On the 17th, as the hard-pressed troops in the Marne pocket fought against a general counterattack of mounting power, demolition of their bridges exceeded the desperate reconstruction. To move guns south of the river was hopeless. On the following day Ludendorff ordered preparations to evacuate the pocket.80

On both sides the interest of the high commands now shifted to other fields. Ludendorff traveled north to Flanders. At first light of the 18th the French Tenth and Sixth Armies struck between the Aisne and the Marne and began Foch's counteroffensive with a surprising success that clearly compelled withdrawal from the Marne salient won in the May Breakthrough. The tide of battle had turned, for the last time in the war.81 The Division Aérienne, ordered to broaden its support to include the counteroffensive, transferred its 2d Brigade to the front of Tenth Army. The IX Brigade remained in place to support Sixth Army.82

By the night of 1 August the German front again stood behind the Aisne, where in 1914 the first retreat from the Marne had halted. Losses since 15 July had been immense, and, Ludendorff wrote, "the effort to incline the Entente nations to peace by German victories before the coming of the Americans in great force had therefore failed." The need to shift reserves to the AisneMarne battle spelled the end of plans for Operation Hagen against the British. The next offensive would be assumed jointly by the British Fourth Army and the French First Army to reduce the Amiens salient, and to that front the Division

Aérienne and the IX Brigade moved again.84 The storm that broke there on 8 August crushed the German line of resistance.85 To defend the bridges over the Somme essential for retreat, the Jagdgeschwader No. 1 flew to the fight, where one by one its famous squadrons were broken.86 The 8th of August, Ludendorff wrote later, would be remembered as "the black day of the German Army in the history of this war."87

THE FINAL titanic surge of the German armies, upon which the play of air forces exercised so notable an influence, apparently made no impression on Lt. Colonel George Marshall that his biographer found worth reporting. Pershing's Headquarters American Expeditionary Forces, which Marshall joined at the climax of the struggle raging since 21 March, commanded no troops in the battle. But on 18 July when Army Group Reserve opened Foch's counteroffensive, the American I Corps took part as the right wing of the Sixth Army's attack. Four of the 18 divisions on line for the two-army operation were U.S. divisions. The combat aviation of Sixth Army was composed of the British IX Brigade and the U.S. 1st Pursuit Group, the Americans furnishing four of the nine pursuit squadrons included.88 Although Pershing's headquarters was remote from the command and control of the battle, more than incidental attention surely was given at Chaumont to the methods and fortunes of these forces.

An extensive and prophetic tactical air campaign was now planned and conducted as part of the first offensive under American command, for which Pershing was forming the U.S. First Army from the U.S. I, IV, and V Corps and the French II Colonial Corps. First Army's objective would be the reduction of the St. Mihiel salient, 13 American and 4 French divisions to take part. The salient to be attacked lay south of Verdun on the Woëvre plain as a sharp wedge driven into the lines of the French Army Group East. Through the years of assault and then quiet the ground had been organized with impressive field fortifications and layers of defense zones. But like all salients it invited flank attack, and for it Pershing planned the familiar double envelopment of its tip by a main blow against its south face and a secondary attack into the west face.89

Appointed Chief of the Air Service, First Army, was Colonel William Mitchell, with station in Pershing's advance headquarters at Ligny-enBarrois. For the St. Mihiel offensive against a peaked salient with a base 35 miles wide, he would have the use of 701 pursuit, 323 day bomber, 91 night bomber, and 366 observation aircraft, a total of 1481 airplanes of which about one third flew in his score of U.S. squadrons. Those squadrons formed the 1st, 2d, and 3d Pursuit Groups, the 96th Day Bombardment Group, and the observation units. In addition Pétain contributed handsomely in French aviation for the duration of the offensive, loaning six observation squadrons, five artillery squadrons, one pursuit group, the Groupement Villomé of night bombardment, and the entire Division Aérienne. At Foch's request Marshal Haig also agreed to support Mitchell with General Trenchard's "Independent Force" of four day and five night bombardment squadrons organized for strategic bombing.90

Mitchell's operations planning showed that he had taken advantage of his learning opportunities to come abreast of the most advanced French and British concepts. While there was nothing doctrinally original in his handling of the air forces placed at his disposal for the St. Mihiel campaign, he displayed clear tactical understanding of the potential of these forces for a tightly integrated offensive battle plan governed by the same objective as governed the offensive on the ground, the capture of the St. Mihiel salient. Doubtless integration was greatly eased by the relatively narrow front of the offensive and the fact that only a single army was to be engaged. But in contrast to the piecemeal dispersion and commitment of the Division Aérienne as a reserve rather than offensive force in the Second Battle of the Marne, less than two months past, and to the variety of local controls and missions exercised and assigned throughout the Allied air forces during that broad battle, Mitchell's firm integration of the St. Mihiel air plan amounted to strategic innovation as well as effective tactical understanding of his component forces for employment as their inventors had intended they be employed. This was particularly true about his commitment of the Division Aérienne, which gave the offensive spearhead in his provisionally unified tactical air force, the deployment of which is shown on the accompanying map.91

One part of this force was assigned the air de

troop forces moving into or retreating from the battlefront. All pursuit would attack enemy aviation vigorously upon sight to prevent harassment of friendly troops.

Another part of the force was assigned the interdiction of communications. To slow any movement of reserves from other sectors, the French and Italian bombardment groups of the Groupement Villomé would attack detraining railheads as far in the rear as Longuyon, Conflans, Chambley, and Metz and the bridges of the Meuse above Sedan. The farther rear would be attacked by the bombers of the British Independent Force. During the First Army artillery preparation they would attack airdromes and the railway stations in the Metz zone, at Courcelles, and at Thionville. After the attack began, the raids would concentrate on the railway targets at Metz and Courcelles.

The third part of Mitchell's forces was formed by the Division Aérienne. It was to operate entirely free of the ground battle and form an air front for the defeat of the German air forces in the sector. Mitchell charged the division with the destruction of all hostile planes and balloons in advance of the salient's base, which was also the line of exploitation set for the ground force offensive, and beyond on the flanks as far as 12 miles north of Pont-à-Mousson on the right and Etain on the left. At the same time, in acting to provoke the counterair battle, the division's bombing escadres would attack the lines of communications deep in and behind the salient.92

Operating as one unit, the division would advance by brigades. One brigade would strike into the salient flank, sweeping over Vigneulles and into the enemy rear as far as Conflans or Briey, where the bombardment wing would attack. While the German air defense fought the first brigade, the second would strike the other salient flank, timing its penetration to enter the air battle while the first brigade had fuel left for thirty minutes of combat. During that half hour the massed air division would be deployed for battle, which the German fighter squadrons had to accept or stand by while communications junctions or their own airfields were bombed,93

After the successes of 18 July and 8 August Foch had cooled about the St. Mihiel offensive, which he now regarded as a diversion from his

grand final battle. He gave in to Pershing's insistence only with the provision that First Army open a major offensive to drive north between the Meuse River and the Argonne Forest no later than 25 September. The St. Mihiel salient was speedily captured. Well aware of the impending attack, the enemy had begun evacuating the salient before the American guns opened fire on 12 September, a withdrawal that was hastened by the violence with which the First Army attacked on the ground and in the air. Foch was pleased and the German command disturbed by the quality of the new national army formally introduced at St. Mihiel.

Nevertheless Pershing had been obliged to mount a second offensive while conducting the first. The requirements for the Meuse-Argonne opening involved the movement of 600,000 men and 2700 artillery pieces, more than half of which had to be shifted from the St. Mihiel battle area sixty miles away. The rest of the troops would come equal or greater distances from the training grounds. All moves had to be made at night.?* This complicated, behind-the-lines maneuver brought Marshall's wartime experience to its high-water mark. Marshall, now colonel, was instructed by the chief of staff to compose the many orders putting the transfer into motion. The meticulous detail of these orders and the successful management of their execution earned him the reputation of a "wizard."95

Marshall had also participated in the preliminary work on the St. Mihiel plan, and the annexes to the field order published 7 September were produced under his "supervision" by the headquarters sections concerned.96 He must have been acquainted with Mitchell's Annex No. 3, the subject of which was "Plan of Employment of Air Service Units, American First Army.' ."97 But neither the St. Mihiel air operations, in which Mitchell put on his greatest show, nor those of the subsequent MeuseArgonne drive, where Mitchell, commanding an initial 821 aircraft, successfully defended the jammed roads after the first days' advances, aroused in Marshall any interest that is noted in the Pogue biography. As a very methodical staff officer, Marshall possibly was completely absorbed in more immediate, if more circumscribed, operational detail, for example, the writing of the route orders to the Meuse-Argonne.