How Was The Two First Airborne Divisions Selected

[patches]

Has this been discused before? Never seen anything to my satisfaction as to why these two wear choosen, the other 3 Airborne Divisions? well there easy, they were completely new Divisions raised for the war.

 

Why were the 82nd Division and the later 101st Divisions selected to be the first Airborne Divisions, both of these were reactivated former National Army Divisions (Reserve Divisions since the 1920s), why not say the 98th or the 78th, or 91st etc etc, most of these divisions really to include the 82nd and 101st Divisions where recently reactivated with one really not having anything over the other as far as training and experience was concered. Was it just these Divisions shoulder patches that they were selected? like it would be suitable for the new AIRBORNE tab to worn over, in the case of the 101st's the Bald Eagle Head, with it connotations of fierceness and aerial flight?

[J_Andrews]

The War Dept did not wantan RA Div or an NG Div, because they had "constituencies" that might not like the Airborne (suicide) thing. AND the two Abn DIVs were also considered to be maybe fated to be short-lived. So the Pentagon wanted a couple "clean" and disposable Divs, from the ORC pool.

 

The 82nd was selected because it was already mobilized, and as it had been a Motorized (lots of trucks) TO&E TEST unit, and that concept had been semi-abandoned, it was ready for re-purposing. No doubt it helped that it was "The All-American". It also probably helped that its CG was Omar Bradley; there were probably a spate of telephone calls between LA and DC to set it up.

 

The 101st probably WAS recommended because: 1. It was not yet mobilized at all, so available without encumbrance; 2. it had a nice SSI and catchy nickname.

 

Keep in mind that plans called for activating a 15th and 19th Abn Div. The subordinate units of the 15th, and the major ones for the 19th, were actually CONSTITUTED, but not ACTIVATED. The first and foremost thing that aborted them was the difficulties with the GLIDER program. Second was earmarking enough C-47s (and C-46s, in plans) to lift two or even three Abn Divs in a single op. The third "killer" was the casualties incurred in Sicily and Italy; not KIA, but WIA and injured and POW. All categories of casualties required priority replacements (or the entire Div could be withdrawn for reconstitution in-Theatre, taking 90-180 days). Levies for overseas replacements gutted the 17th and 13th at least once each, delaying their shipping over. (But, hey, no big hurry, without sufficient gliders and transports, right?) It was a close thing for Abn Comd to train enough paras in 1943-1944, but it managed. (There was no shortage of MEN in the pipeline, just time and facilities for them.) The call-forward for more paras due to the March 45 conversion to new TO&Es just about sucked ABC dry; where there had been thousands of paras still Stateside, suddenly there were only hundreds. No 541st or 542nd PIRs, and ABC instructors and staff were deeply decremented.

 

A vet who was assigned to ABC (who went to the 11th in mid-45 with the 541st, only to be injured and reassigned to a Corps HQ -- off jump status!) once told me that he had seen paperwork mentioning a 107th Abn Div and he said that the SSI we know as the 108th was its patch -- ??!!. However, please note that the 108th SSI has SEVEN sides, not EIGHT...hhhmmm.

 

The 515th PIR of the 13th Abn Div was, he said, originally organic to the 15th Abn Div, but activated as a separate unit under ABC (then put in the 13th). The QM and Ord Cos of the 15th were also activated, under ABC, but at the end of the war were un-designated Abn and sent (IIRC) to the Philippines/Okinawa.

[patches]

Thank you. As far as Brad goes he was gone by the time the 82nd was redesignated right? Ridgway as his Assistant Divisional Commander was from June 42 CO of the then still 82nd Infantry Division. Maybe it was Ridgways influance that got his Division to be the first full Division to become Airborne. John you mentioned phone calls from LA to DC, what would Los Angeles have to do with this all?

 

I also recall reading somewhere (can't remember where, maybe Jerry Devlin's Paratrooper?) that the 82nd was selected for some reason because it's location, it being posted at Camp Claiborne, but it was kind of sketchy, at least as I can remember, ever heard this?

[BEAR]

like it would be suitable for the new AIRBORNE tab to worn over, in the case of the 101st's the Bald Eagle Head, with it connotations of fierceness and aerial flight?

 

 

[vostoktrading]

"Thank you. As far as Brad goes he was gone by the time the 82nd was redesignated right? Ridgway as his Assistant Divisional Commander was from June 42 CO of the then still 82nd Infantry Division. Maybe it was Ridgways influance that got his Division to be the first full Division to become Airborne."

 

I think 82nd was chosen because they were the best at that point, of all the divisions gearing up and training stateside that were available to be chosen to be airborne.

Bradley & Ridgeway had both been noticed years before by George Marshall for their abilities and were quickly promoted over others because of this.

Bradley and his staff did a great job getting the 82nd Division ready to be an infantry division. Bradley was moved on to the 28th to try to do the same with them. Ridgeway wasn't even airborne until he was given the job of making 82nd airborne. Typically he did his job 200% and drove himself and his men hard to achieve what was needed.

82nd was shredded to provide the new 101st with a cadre. Why was 101st chosen to be airborne? So that their cool looking patch could sell for absurd amounts after Band of Brothers what shown to viewers around the world I guess.

[Gregory]

Patches,

 

You have initialized extremely interesting thread but a thread worth big book. It is very long story to describe what was bad and what was good in the process of creation of the US abn forces. Up to this time the American authors prefer to write only about positive aspects of that process without negative factors. Is it a history? No, and this is bad news for the readers and fans of history.

 

From today's perspective we may admire the USA and your national Spirit of Creativeness in which the USA was able to make up for lost time of interwar period. On the other hand the USA was way too much fascinated by early nazi system of abn forces. Take a look at US WWII aviation press and you will see how much the USA was fascinated by the German concept of abn forces. Modern authors do not want to use this literature in the bibliography of their publications. When the Germans withdrew themselves from so-called air-landing concept the USA still trained it. When the Germans withdrew themselves from small, uneconomic, ineffective cargo gliders the USA used them on a mass scale. The German air-landing concept was good to fight against miniature Benelux countries but not against main Allies.

 

But many other US things were the best in the world - pioneer avionics for the air drops, relatively good parachutes, relatively good equipment for abn forces, very good cargo planes etc.

 

Regards

 

Gregory

[J_Andrews]

"LA" is the postal code abbreviation for LOUISIANA, where the 82nd Div was (Camp Claiborne).

[J_Andrews]

On Gregory's Post #6: I have long wished to see a properly researched book on how th4e manufacture and inventory of cargo planes and engines was FINITE, and how shortages (both actual and predicted) affected operations. Several aircraft designs were cancelled because they would compete with the higher-priority B-29 program for engines (Wright R-3350s) and other materials and parts (i.e. tires, instruments and even wiring).

I met a vet once who was a flight engineer on C-47s with IXTCC in the ETO, but as a 16-yr old he worked at Douglas on C-47s in 1942-43. He said that that it was continual battle to keep engines and other parts on-hand, and that even though "everybody wanted more 47s" (Navy, Marines, Brits, etc.) the allocations were skewed to the bombers, etc.

[patches]

Patches,

 

You have initialized extremely interesting thread but a thread worth big book. It is very long story to describe what was bad and what was good in the process of creation of the US abn forces. Up to this time the American authors prefer to write only about positive aspects of that process without negative factors. Is it a history? No, and this is bad news for the readers and fans of history.

 

From today's perspective we may admire the USA and your national Spirit of Creativeness in which the USA was able to make up for lost time of interwar period. On the other hand the USA was way too much fascinated by early nazi system of abn forces. Take a look at US WWII aviation press and you will see how much the USA was fascinated by the German concept of abn forces. Modern authors do not want to use this literature in the bibliography of their publications. When the Germans withdrew themselves from so-called air-landing concept the USA still trained it. When the Germans withdrew themselves from small, uneconomic, ineffective cargo gliders the USA used them on a mass scale. The German air-landing concept was good to fight against miniature Benelux countries but not against main Allies.

 

But many other US things were the best in the world - pioneer avionics for the air drops, relatively good parachutes, relatively good equipment for abn forces, very good cargo planes etc.

 

Regards

 

Gregory

 

The reasons why the Germans shelved their Airborne/Air Landing capability is much more complex then all that. To name a few we all know that Hitler was agast at the casualties in Operation Mercury, but there came a point, that there was no way the Germans, even if they wanted to, conduct full scale Airborne/ Air Landing operations, this was in the main because of an actual shortage of Aircraft for these type of operations, more so than the Allies had ever experienced, they had just lost to many of them, and not just back in May 1941 over Crete, but on all types of missions, like missions over the Mediterranean and North Africa, from November to December 1942 alone 128 JU 52s were lost, with another 36 in January 1943, don't no off the top of my head how many were lost from the Start of the North African Campaign, but it was alot, the air operations at Stalingrad, how many JU 52s were lost? 296, that at the very begining of 1943, it was lack of transport, and the realization by the Germans that any airborne operation after 1942 would fail because of this.

 

The Gliders, well as we know the Germans motorized them, making them in effect regular flying transport planes, evidently the Americans and British never seen the need to do this, why? I suspect that they were confident enough that they had enough tugs, to tow them, which they did really, it got tight, but it was not an operations killer, if so Market Garden would never occured, nor Varsity, Varsity we know had to be scaled back by leaving the 13th Airborne Division back in France because lack of Transport and gliders and tugs, but it still went on reguardless, with two full Airborne Divisions and Corps troops.

[Gregory]

Re: The German air landing concept.

 

For the sake of justice let's say that early 1940s not the US Army only fell into the trap of the air landing concept developed by the Germans to invade very quickly and effectively small and poorly defended countries with their almost undefended air force bases.

 

The British wasted time (the same as the USA) and they fell into the same trap of German-like manner of thinking. They trained their 52nd (Lowland) Infantry Division to be air landing unit according to old German concept and never used that Division in such a role. The same goes for the US 2nd ID -- they pushed jeeps, guns, trailers, other wheeled equipment on boards of the C-47s and cargo plane wooden mock-ups and for what? For nothing. Both the British 52nd and the US 2nd Divisions remained in their basic roles of classic infantry units never transported by aerial combat cargo system behind enemy lines to capture there terrain of any objects.

 

It would be very good concept if the USA or UK would like to invade Barbados but not to fight against powerful and well-organized Third Reich.

[Gregory]

The Gliders, well as we know the Germans motorized them, making them in effect regular flying transport planes, evidently the Americans and British never seen the need to do this, why?

Because both the Americans and British motorized their cargo gliders too late, what is more the helicopter era was coming.

 

The British (Spec. X.4/44) built 20 GAL 58 Hamilcar Mk X motor gliders of which first of them did its maiden flight in February 1945. There were the plans to use them against Japanese but it was too late.

 

If to trust the US wartime media the Pentagon presented own CG-4A-based motorized cargo gliders (XPG-1, XPG-2, PG-2A, XPG-2B, XPG-3, XPG-3A) as possible "flying hospitals" mainly being STOL aerial crafts. They were to be the casevac/medevac powered gliders but also in this case there was no need to develop that concept in view of the fact that helicopter industry was born then, what is more all US powered gliders were seriously underpowered with their Franklin and Jacobs engines.