The basic American bomber tactical unit was the squadron of 6 planes formed into 2 elements of 3 planes, the middle plane in the lead with the other two back on ether side. Within this formation each plane flew with 100 feet of clearance from the nearest point of the next closest aircraft. This, allowed the defensive firepower of the planes to be used together while allowing sufficient room for the pilots to fly without undue concern of collisions. In the early American missions the squadrons would fly separately from one another (it was also found that the 6 plane front in this formation gave a rather good bombing pattern). This type of formation made the preliminary form up easy and as a formation it handled well. However their were serious flaws in this concept that wouldrnandate a change in tactics. The first drawback was lack of sufficient firepower. Six planes just could not put enough rounds into the sounding air space to seriously deter the German fighters. The second, was lack of support from other squadrons which made it easier for the Germans to pick apart one squadron at a time. The final problem was that at this time each bomber dropped it's bombs individually, which tended to reduce the efficiency of the bomb run. To remedy these problems the bombers now started to fly in a staggered formation which was called a combat box (see diagram 1). This formation massed 3 squadrons together into an 18 plane formation. The 18 plane group was split into two nine plane squadrons. The tail squadron was above and behind the lead squadron - This formation was a big improvement but still had problems. Being more compact the defensive potential was greatly increased, but because all the planes in each squadron flew at the same altitude gunners fields of fire were still being blocked by friendly planes. Another drawback was that the formation was a lot less flexible, on turns the outside aircraft could lose sight of the lead aircraft. The commander of the 305th Bomb Group. Col. Curtis Le May, devised a modification to this formation late in 42. This new formation still used 18 planes but went back to the three squadrons scheme. Now no two planes flew at the same altitude. (see diagram 2). Within the three plane trio the lead plane had the two following planes above and behind and below and behind. This opened up more fields of fire for the formation. Le May also prohibited the bombers from dropping bombs individually. Instead the whole group dropped it's bombs on signal from the lead bomber (which made it even rougher for the lead bombers once the Germans figured this out). The groups were now spaced approx 1.5 miles apart and echeloned back towards the sun.. This 'Javelin' formation made it harder for the attacking fighters to get good positions on the bombers. At the same time the higher formations had a harder time keeping up which resulted in straggling, with the stragglers much easier to pick off. By February of 43 the 'Javelin' gave way to the 'Wedge' formation. This formation had the lead group (of 18 aircraft) in the middle with the following groups placed in echelon above and behind. as well as below and behind. This helped reduce the straggling of the higher group(s) to some extent. By April of 43 the determined efforts of the German fighters necessitated yet another adjustment to the Combat Box. The groups were now formed as the overall wedge formation (see diagram 3). Additionally three 18 aircraft groups were moved closer together. Now 54 aircraft had any where from 486 to 594 50 cal.. machine guns spewing lead out from and area 1.3 miles wide, .5 miles deep, and .33 miles from front to back! It goes without saying that this formation was unwieldy and hard to hold when any kind of turning was involved This formation was used for both Schweinfurt raids and was not revised until January of 44. At this time the group was reduced from 18 aircraft to 12 and the basic bombardment group from 54 to 36 aircraft. The group now flew in more of a true box formation (see diagram 4). The next major change did not happen till February of 45. The groups were further reduced down to 9 aircraft, but four groups were placed together for the same 36 planes. As the Luftwaffe became less and less of a threat the need for more manageable formations started to override the need for massed defensive fire power (the availability of the long range escort P51 also reduced the need). Needless to say when you have 1000+ planes in the air all heading for the same target one is desirous of the ability to keep from flying into one another! The diagrams show the ideal / theoretical spacing and look for the formations. In actual combat they would not always be so. Planes dropped out for mechanical trouble, loses due to enemy fighter attacks as well as flak. The key to survival for the bomber crews was to maintain the formation as long as possible because once an aircraft fell behind it's chances of making it back to base were slim indeed. FollowNing is a list of some of the books I consulted while working on my modifications for SQUADRONS. Note: all the diagrams were based on those in Alfred Price's book. I issue 20 I mentioned that at Origins a new W.W.II air game was introduced to the West Coast, SQUADRONS, a simple game system that covers the Battle of Britain using 1/285 or 1/300 scale planes. The rules are going to be expanded to cover the entire war as well as the Korean conflict. Needless to say since learning the rules I have been looking into modifying the system for the American bomber offensive from 1942 on (being too impatient to await the official release!). I have found that the basic rules system is very easily adapted with out making them complex. (whereas the original rules takes from 15 to 20 min. to explain with my modifications it now takes about 30 - 45 minutes to go through.) The game scale is on a one to one basis so I had to start doing some research on unit tactics (each player controls from 3 to 9 planes depending on the scenario). This article will attempt to give the general picture of the continued evolution of the US heavy bomber formations over Europe from 1942 till the end of the war. 1 . Bendiner, Elmer. The Fall of Fortresses. G.P. Putnam's Sons. New York. 1980. 2. Davis, Larry. B-24 Liberator in Action. Squadron/Signal Pub., Inc. Carrollton Texas. 1987. 3. Davis., Larry. B-17 in Action. Squadron/Signal Pub., Inc.. Carrollton Texas. 1984. 4. Price, Alfred. The Bomber in WW2. Charles Scribrers' and Son. 1976. 5. Sweetman, John. Schweinfurt Disaster in the Skies. Ballantine Books Inc.New York New York. 1971. Back to Table of Contents The Messenger October 1994 Back to The Messenger List of Issues Back to MagWeb Magazine List © Copyright 1994 by HMGS/PSW. This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com