Billy Mitchell's Parachute Plan
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Billy Mitchell’s Parachute Plan By Phillip S. Meilinger n April 1940, as part of Hitler’s was startlingly original and clearly balloons at fairgrounds for a century. plan to invade Norway, 24 Ju visionary. The fi rst successful military jump 52 transport aircraft, escorted For most of World War I, the Western from an airplane occurred in March by two twin-engine fi ghters, Front was a stagnant and bloody trench 1912, made by a US soldier at Jef- dropped 130 German paratroop- war. Frontal assaults were common ferson Barracks, Mo. During World Iers near Sola airfi eld at Stavanger. because outfl anking maneuvers were War I, soldiers in tethered observation Dropped from an altitude of just 400 impossible—the front stretched in an balloons deployed along the Western feet, the paratroopers landed and se- unbroken line from the North Sea to Front wore parachutes because the cured the valuable airfi eld in an hour. Switzerland. Generals on both sides balloons came under frequent attacks German reinforcements began fl ooding made numerous attempts to break the from enemy pursuit (fi ghter) aircraft. in by air; Norway fell in days. stalemate, using rolling artillery bar- The operation was the fi rst major rages, poison gas, fl amethrowers, new A DEADLY VISE combat paratroop drop in history. Many penetration tactics, tanks, and attack A downed balloon was counted as an would follow, and paratroop forces— aircraft. They hoped to break through aerial victory, and some pilots became quite a bit larger than the relatively the lines and create fl anks, thus restor- aces based on their ability to “fl ame sau- small contingent at Stavanger—came ing mobility to the battlefi eld. sages.” Frank Luke received the Medal to be fi elded by all the great powers These tactics were at best only of Honor for such actions—downing 14 of that war. moderately successful and then only at German balloons in less than three weeks. This new concept—vertical envel- certain times and places. Even the huge When an attack came, it was standard opment—didn’t originate in World infl ux of fresh American infantrymen procedure for winch operators below to War II, however, but in World War in early 1918 made little difference. It rapidly lower the balloon, but not before I. Brig. Gen. Billy Mitchell, the top appeared the bloodbath would continue. the observer in the basket quickly jumped American air commander of that war, Mitchell thought in the third dimen- out and deployed his parachute. devised a plan for dropping a divi- sion, however, and parachutes came to Italy began parachuting spies into sion of American infantrymen behind his mind. enemy territory during the war, and German lines. The war ended before Parachutes weren’t a new idea; they’d the French dropped two-man demoli- the plan could be executed, but it been used by daredevils jumping out of tion crews behind German lines in 58 AIR FORCE Magazine / August 2014 Airborne operations were vital in World War II, but Billy Mitchell had devised a credible plan in the late days of World War I. At left: US paratroopers land in the Philippines in 1945. Here: C-47s drop para- troopers into the Netherlands during Operation Market Garden in 1944. Brig. Gen. Billy Mitchell had proposed such attempts at “vertical envelopment” more National Archives photo than two decades earlier. early 1918. Mitchell knew of these In his war memoirs, Mitchell wrote Engineers in New York. This group was activities. He had already employed that he’d suggested to Pershing that the one of the most prestigious organiza- aircraft in mass formations to clear the entire 1st Infantry Division be assigned tions of scientists and engineers in the skies of enemy aircraft and to strafe permanently to the Air Service. Persh- country, and Mitchell revealed the idea and bomb enemy troop positions and ing mulled the idea for a few minutes he’d pitched to Pershing fi ve months supply lines. In September 1918, he and then told him to go ahead and previously. Mitchell said, “We had a had commanded more than 1,400 Al- begin planning. He would decide if plan, which we were going to try this lied aircraft, an unprecedented total, the plan looked feasible after he saw spring if the war had not stopped, and during the Meuse-Argonne offensive. more details. it would have worked, too. We were The next month he approached Gen. Delighted, Mitchell hurried back to going to send our men over the German John J. Pershing, commander of the his headquarters at Ligny-en-Barrois lines in airplanes and drop them down American Expeditionary Forces, with to lay the idea before his staff. He in parachutes and let them attack the an idea to break the trench stalemate. directed his operations offi cer, Maj. enemy in the rear, while our men were Mitchell proposed using British- Lewis H. Brereton, to begin planning attacking the front.” made Handley Page bombers, as well for a major airborne operation to take He said he planned to use the 1st as Italian-built Capronis, to drop in- place the following spring. In his own Infantry Division—12,000 men—to fantrymen plus medium-size machine memoirs, Brereton wrote that Mitchell be dropped at Metz. His plan was guns behind enemy lines. He argued “dumped plans in my lap” and told him superior to those being drawn for a that such a surprise attack would catch to get busy. major ground offensive against Metz, the Germans manning the trenches in The war ended three weeks later, because that city was guarded by “divi- a deadly vise—Allied infantry would however, so the drop would not go into sion after division of the crack troops attack from the front while the para- action, and planning did not get very of the German army, anticipating our troopers would attack from the rear. far. Nonetheless, Mitchell spoke and move.” Using the ground plan, Metz The Germans would undoubtedly break wrote about the idea after the war would eventually have fallen, Mitchell and fl ee, and mobility would fi nally be was over. argued, but at tremendous cost—yet an- restored to the battlefi eld after nearly In March 1919, Mitchell gave a other bloodbath for which the Western four years of stalemate. speech to the Society of Automobile Front had become infamous. AIR FORCE Magazine / August 2014 59 AP photo Writing in a May 1926 newspaper tions. The pursuit aircraft would then be expanded, saying, “Almighty God article, Mitchell stated that he’d been join up with the bombers and escort helps those who fi rst help themselves.” promised the use of 60 squadrons of them back to friendly territory. Clearly, Mitchell’s concept for an Handley Page bombers—1,200 air- Mitchell continued that once the airborne operation was visionary, but craft—and that he would also be given paratroopers were on the ground, was it feasible? When he proposed the the services of a top infantry division. the converted bombers would be able idea in October 1918, there were nowhere The Handley Page O/400 was a heavy to resupply them with ammunition, near the 1,200 bombers available that bomber used by the Royal Air Force to food, and other supplies with little Mitchell said would be necessary. Yet, strike German positions, airfi elds, and difficulty. orders had been placed for more, and industrial facilities. Mitchell calculated Men would be lost during the drop, it is likely such a number of Handley that each aircraft would be able to carry Mitchell admitted, and those on the Pages and Capronis would have been in 10 fully loaded paratroopers as well as ground would be somewhat vulner- service by the spring of 1919. Would that two medium-size machine guns. able, but he noted that those soldiers many aircraft have been entrusted to a The Handley Page was a big aircraft, would have a potential strength of 2,400 young brigadier general? Some 1,400 but even so, at 10 men per airplane, it machine guns. combat aircraft, consisting of units from would take a huge air fl eet to transport “If we could have only got 10 per- the French and British air arms besides an entire division. By war’s end, the cent in action against the enemy’s rear, the Air Service, had been under his RAF had some 250 Handley Pages we should have been successful. One command at the Meuse-Argonne, so the operational, with another 1,500 on machine gun, properly placed, can notion of Mitchell leading an airborne order. Moreover, the Handley Page hold up a battalion at times,” Mitchell air armada is not far-fetched. V/1500 was also entering production. asserted in the May 1926 article. He The bombers would have needed to This four-engine behemoth would be added that the Germans would have be modifi ed. Although the British and able to carry up to 20 paratroopers. been subjected “to the most withering Italian aircraft would have been large Paratroopers on each aircraft would fi re ever known. ... The pathway would enough to carry 10 to 20 men plus their carry extra bandoliers of ammunition have been thrown open for the American equipment and extra machine guns, the plus machine guns. This mighty air Army to advance into Metz.” airplanes were not designed for such a armada would be escorted by hundreds purpose. In addition, some provision of pursuit and attack airplanes. Three WOULD IT HAVE WORKED? would have had to have been made for the miles from the front lines these escorts By this time, Mitchell had already paratroopers to exit the aircraft—simply would break to the left and right, and “at been court-martialed, found guilty, and jumping out of the observer’s cockpit a predetermined moment, those attack resigned.