Hot & Heavy

Not for months had Germans had such grim repetitive reminders of a deadly, radio-borne promise made to them last summer by burly Air Marshal Sir Arthur Travers Harris, head of the R.A.F.'s Bombing Command: You have no chance. Soon we will be coming over every night, every day--rain, flood or snow--we and the Americans.

In autumn's fair weather there had been nights and days when a small raid or two and the endless slashing of Allied intruder aircraft against Germany's overstrained transport system were only pallid proofs that "Red" Harris intended to make good. But now, in January, when the winter was at its worst, the raids came hot, heavy and without cease. Perhaps, at long last, this was the promised beginning.

The Music. Even Berlin caught it, not once but twice on successive nights, not token-wise but in two crashing raids. For the first time in more than 14 months (except for several light raids by Russian bombers) Allied aircraft wheeled in "strong force" (meaning hundreds) over the camouflaged symbol of the Reich's indestructibility.

In a Lancaster on the first raid was New York Timesman James MacDonald, winner of a coin toss that made him representative of the U.S. press. Carefully he noted that the big bomber whipped over the camouflaged decoys on the approach to the Reich's capital and planted its bombs in the midst of fires set by others ahead of it. When his bomber was 60 miles away on the trip home he could still see the red flare of Berlin's fires.

Through the raid Berlin's great antiaircraft defenses thundered in the night. But strong as they still were, they had apparently been reduced in strength to beef up the defenses of the Ruhr. Also it seemed that the gunners were not alertly on the job. Britain lost only one bomber. When the R.A.F. crews gathered, teacups in hand, for their interrogations back home, they agreed that few night fighters had come up to meet them.

In Berlin's 54th raid of the war, "Red" Harris had picked up the task he had pledged himself to resume. Next night his bombers were back again. But this time Berlin was waiting and there were night fighters, apparently drafted from the Ruhr, where they could ill be spared. And moonlight (instead of clouds as on the night before) gave them better opportunities. That night the R.A.F. lost 22 planes.

The Germans slashed back at London in two raids. But the force was small, and the showing to Englishmen was not so impressive as the thundering eloquence of London's anti-aircraft defense, unleashed in full voice for the first time since it was refitted and strengthened months ago. Germany's weak reply again indicated that the Luftwaffe was not what it used to be.

Unhappy Valleys. On eight of eleven successive nights in the new year, the R.A.F. had bashed the Ruhr, plowing through the strongest anti-aircraft defenses the world has ever seen. In "Happy Valley," the R.A.F.'s ironic label for the industrial heart of the Reich, few bombs had been wasted, for the factories and foundries lie cheek by jowl for miles. And on their edges are the windowless homes of the Ruhr workers. Their nights were shattered, their work was impaired even when they went back to jobs in plants that had escaped blockbusters and incendiaries.

The need for destruction in the Ruhr was direr than it had been since last winter. From the Ruhr came steel, heavy castings, forgings and weapons for Adolf Hitler's all-too-effective submarine fleets.

The bombers also struck more immediately at the U-boats. Twice last week the R.A.F. raided Lorient, plastered the repair shops that U.S. Flying Fortresses and Liberators had left standing, and rained blockbusters on the huge U-boat pens. Whether they succeeded in getting through the 11-ft. concrete roofs and walls of the pens, the R.A.F. did not say. But they had slowed up work that Germany dearly wants to finish. A third pen of like capacity (ten U-boats) is being built nearby. Neither the R.A.F. nor the U.S.'s Eighth Air Force had any intention of letting the Germans finish that one.

U.S. Bombers ranged in small groups over France, smashing away with meticulous accuracy at pinpoint targets. The Eighth Air Force appeared still to be far short of the vast number of planes needed for raids in force.

But the Eighth ranged out by day, fought its way through thin screens of Germany's over-stretched fighter force, and hoped for many more B-17s and B-24s.

There was plenty of lighter equipment --two-engined bombers and fighters--to keep the enemy nervous and edgy. Manned by both R.A.F. and U.S. crews, they swirled over the Continent from dawn to dark; on one day 400 of them were on the loose. They hacked at light industrial establishments, shot up railroad trains, left locomotives steaming from their sides and ready for a tow to the repair shops.

Germany was beginning to feel the shock of another wholesale offensive from the air. But it would be decisive only if it were stepped up in strength and never left to flag. If it languished and died in a few weeks--as such offensives have languished before--it would be no more than a few nails in a coffin still to be built.

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