In mid-September General Henry H. Army Air Force, proposed that every available British and American airplane be used on some clear day to swarm all over the German Reich, attacking military objectives in towns that had hitherto been unmolested by the air forces.
This type of operation, he felt, would afford the Germans an opportunity to witness at firsthand the might of the Allies and to reflect on their own helplessness. But clear days that opened up the entire expanse of Germany to such a venture were rarities, especially during the autumn, and during the winter the Allied air forces were tied up, in part, with the German counter-offense in the Ardennes, and, in part, giving first priority to attacking German oil targets.
By the middle of February the several Allied land armies were prepared to resume the offensive toward the Rhine which the Germans had interrupted in December. The Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force SHAEF requested the air forces to utilize all available Anglo-American air power in a blow at German rail and water transportation facilities which would result in an immediate disruption of the German lines of communication and transportation system in general, and that the impact would be of direct and immediate benefit to the ground forces.
SHAEF desired British-American bombers and fighters to range over most of Germany simultaneously on a clear day to attack all sorts of transportation targets: grade crossings, stations, barges, docks, signals, tracks, bridges, and marshalling yards. Most of the objectives were located in small towns that had never been bombed before. Carl Spaatz, commander of U. Each of the Allied air commands which participated was given an area for attack, secondary targets and targets of opportunity to be chosen in the same general area as the primaries if the latter could not be seen.
The opportunity to launch Operation Clarion came on February 22, when most of Germany was expected to be vulnerable to visual-bombing attacks. The tactical air forces received assignments in western and northwestern Germany. The Eighth Air Force had to depart from its usual operating procedures in several respects. Most important of all, the heavy bombers were to attack from about 10,feet or even lower instead of the customary 20,,foot altitudes. Also, they were to form small attacking units instead of organizing into the usual large formations.
