WI. General Kenney gets his B-29s in 1944.

[Draconis]

The first operational deployment of the B-29 was Operation Matterhorn in May of 1944. The commander of the 5th Air Force, George Kenney had lobbied unsuccessfully to get B-29s for his command. It had been decided that the new plane was intended exclusively for the strategic bombing of Japan. Operation Matterhorn, flying from Chinese airbases and supplied through the Hump airlift was an expensive, perhaps wasteful campaign that produced mixed results.

What if General Kenney had been able to persuade FDR that the first test deployment of the B-29 should be in the SWPA under his command? By having Matterhorns' 4 bomb groups based in Darwin, Australia that would certainly have simplified the supply problem with everything being brought in by ship.

From air bases around Darwin all the oil producing facilities and refineries of the DEI would be in range of the B-29. And also the harbours where the IJN was keeping their major ships after withdrawing from Truk. The long range of the B-29 would have been put to good use there as it was the only plane that could reach those targets with an adequate bomb load. And it had the speed, altitude and fire power to defend itself on these long unescorted missions.

General Kenney had proven to be a capable commander. What would he have done with 4 B-29 bomb groups in May of 1944?

 

[viperjock]

If the 58th Bomber Wing went to Australia it could still fall under the command of the Twentieth Air Force. Bombing the DEI oil fields could be seen as a mission for a Strategic Air Force.

Building the actual airfields should be easier. Darwin Australia is not middle-of-nowhere China. It won’t be Chinese peasants building runways by hand. I am sure there was enough heavy construction equipment down under to augment USAAF Engineers.

A B-29 Raid against Nichols Field in the summer of 1944 would be a major propaganda coup. Hap Arnold would be a fool not to authorize such a mission. The Superforts could put the airfield out of commission long before MacArthur lands at Leyte.

 

[Draconis]

If the 58th Bomber Wing went to Australia it could still fall under the command of the Twentieth Air Force. Bombing the DEI oil fields could be seen as a mission for a Strategic Air Force.

Building the actual airfields should be easier. Darwin Australia is not middle-of-nowhere China. It won’t be Chinese peasants building runways by hand. I am sure there was enough heavy construction equipment down under to augment USAAF Engineers.

A B-29 Raid against Nichols Field in the summer of 1944 would be a major propaganda coup. Hap Arnold would be a fool not to authorize such a mission. The Superforts could put the airfield out of commission long before MacArthur lands at Leyte.

Yes, the logistics of enlarging the Darwin bases and supplying them from ships arrived in Darwin harbour are so much more efficient and less costly than going over the Hump. It's hard to imagine a more difficult or more inefficient setup then trying to operate the B-29s out of Western China.

It's almost exactly 2000 miles from Darwin to Manila to hit Nichols Field. That would be a stretch but it's doable with a reduced bomb load.

 

[Draconis]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Matterhorn

I posted a link to Wikipedia's article on Matterhorn. It gives a good account of the difficulties of the operation. And the unintended consequences, namely Ichi-Go. FDR was determined to renew the bombing of Japan as soon as possible but if the cost and difficulties had been better forseen would some other option been chosen?

A good video on Operation Matterhorn.

 

[viperjock]

An additional bonus of having the first B-29 wing in Australia is that maybe The Soviets do not get their hands on Superforts they can reverse-engineer into the TU-4.
The 58th Bomber Wing also does not have to haul it’s own bombs and fuel over the hump. This means less stress on the aircraft and more flying time toward practice missions. Enough supplies can be stockpiled in Darwin to allow for a decent number of missions.
Would the 58th remain in Darwin or would it still eventually join the rest of the Twentieth Air Force in The Marianas?

 

[Draconis]

Would the 58th remain in Darwin or would it still eventually join the rest of the Twentieth Air Force in The Marianas?

I would guess that once General Kenney, backed up by MacArthur, got his hands on those B-29s he would not let them go unless unusual pressure was put on him. Also I would bet that Kenney would be able to show excellent results for the missions flown out of Darwin thereby supporting his argument to keep them.

In OTL when B-29s operations began from the Marianas not all of the CBI based Superfortresses were immediately flown there. The relocation took place over a few months as B-29 missions were still flown out of India in late 1944. So I don't believe the Twentieth air force would lose much capability if the 4 bomb groups remained in Darwin. Later possibly following the rest of the 5th air force to the Philippines to be based at Clark in mid 1945?

 

[PhilKearny]

How would this change the air defenses in Japan?

I think a possible result might be that mainland Japan air defenses and civil defense infrastructure are weaker than IOTL when the B-29 raids from Marianas. Without the spur of the Chinese raids, the Japanese may well invest even less in defense of the home islands. Further, Japan probably would send more interceptors and other resources to the southwest Pacific theater, further weakening home defenses. Many of the fighters may well be lost to escorting P-38s and the Superforts.

The flying probably be less demanding and the bases better equipped. This should result better maintenance and, consequently, in lower losses. Losses probably would be further lowered if P-38s escort these missions.

All these things, with with more available bombs and fuel, should allow the USAAF to gain more experience with the B-29. This means a more successful Marianas based campaign.

 

[PhilKearny]

Another result is this will free up a considerable amount of cargo aircraft.

 

[TonyA]

And it's another turn (righty, tighty) of the tap on Japanese oil.

 

[PhilKearny]

As Australia is more accessible, this may also allow for an earlier and faster fix for the problem of B-29 engine fires and for other issues. Engineers from Boeing, Curtis’s-Wright, and other contractors would be able to be on-site much more easily.

 

[b0ned0me]

Darwin in early ww2 had a population of like 2,000 people or something so it’s essentially starting from scratch in the jungle. But even so, just having the operation on the end of a shipping line rather than the lunatic ramshackle effort of getting stuff to China would be an enormous benefit.

I’m a strategic bombing skeptic so I think the most immediate effect would be what PhilKearney pointed out - that all those transport aircraft would be available to do something useful, such as making the whole Burma campaign into less of a farce.

 

[PMN1]

What kind of numbers are we talking about for the transport aircraft and support equipment that could be 'saved'?

 

[Zheng He]

By 1944 a lot of airfields had been built in the Darwin area so it’s mainly a matter of expanding them.

 

[Draconis]

And it's another turn (righty, tighty) of the tap on Japanese oil.

That was what General Kenney was advocating for. I think as well the 5th air force would have hit the docked BBs and CAs the IJN had withdrew from Truk and had parked in some of the DEIs' ports.

 

[Zheng He]

Didn’t B-29s hit Sumatra from Ceylon?

 

[Draconis]

What kind of numbers are we talking about for the transport aircraft and support equipment that could be 'saved'?

The transports would have been freed up to continue supplying the Chinese and American forces in Western China. Possibly the C-109 tanker planes converted from B-24s would not have been used in the Hump airlift. But most importantly they would not have been misusing B-29s as fuel and bomb transports. A wasteful and unnecessarily desperate practice.

 

[Draconis]

Didn’t B-29s hit Sumatra from Ceylon?

Yes. Prompted by your question I've just been reading about Operation Boomerang. Almost 4000 miles there and back. That is one heck of a flight for those days. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Boomerang

 

[James Ricker]

Japan would face a serious problem with its Navy it would be" use it or lose it".
The Imperial Japanese Navy would send the every available ship on the naval equivalent of a banzai charge against the American Fleet.

 

[viperjock]

Operation Matterhorn is approved to operate out of Darwin. What are the changes to the Philippines campaign?
I imagine that one of the selling points Kenney could use is that the B-29s could eventually move to the Philippines and start a bomber campaign against Formosa.

 

[b0ned0me]

What kind of numbers are we talking about for the transport aircraft and support equipment that could be 'saved'?

No idea but when I read Slims book the impression I came away with was that whenever the US eased off on their China misadventures it freed up enough transport to support pretty much whatever operations in Burma he felt like running. Then after a while they would get ordered back to the hump and 14th Army was back to walking and carrying.