Bombs Away by John Steinbeck Read Free Book Online Page A

water polo, baseball—for in team play the lessons of responsible co-operation are best and most deeply learned. Physically the applicant need not be large. In fact, in some cases it is better if he is small. But he must be very healthy, and he must have no physical disability of any kind. He cannot have defective eyesight or color blindness. But beyond simple physical fitness, he must have other qualities. His manual co-ordination must be above the average. The discipline of limb and muscle must be perfect, and, while he need not be finely trained, he must have a physical system which will respond to the rigid training of the Air Force to emerge a toughened, disciplined soldier.
    Beyond these things, the young man should have great faith in his country, in its future and its future greatness, and he should have a sense of his relation to that future and of his responsibility toward his country’s future, for he will emerge from the war in a position of leadership and in the postwar peaceful world he will have a strong hand.
    A young man having these qualities should make application to join the United States Army Air Force. He should not specify that he wants to be a pilot or a navigator or a bombardier or a gunner, a radio operator or an engineer. The Air Force will give him tests which will prove definitely which position he is most capable of filling, for a man who is capable of being a good pilot need not at all be a good navigator, while a good navigator need not be a good bombardier. Each one has special qualities, and careful Army psychological and physical tests will prove which qualities the applicant has. Lastly, the young man wishing to enter the Air Force should not for a moment get the idea that he is going into something easy. There is neither time nor room for softness or laziness in the Air Force. The cadet will work harder and longer than he thought he could. He will study harder than he has ever studied in school. He will play violently and eat enormously and he will emerge tough, competent, and sure. He will be a crew mate in the hardest-hitting, most competent team this country has ever produced. This is really the Big League in the toughest game we have ever been up against, with the pennant the survival and future of the whole nation.
    If the training of a bomber crew is hard, it is hard for a purpose. For great responsibilities are put into the hands of these young men: the simple responsibility for the expensive and intricate machine that is the bombing plane, responsibility for the secrecy of the bombsight, and beyond these the greatest responsibility of all, for to a large extent the bomber team will be responsible for the safety and survival of the nation.
    The Army Air Force has been given an incredible job to do. Few people on the outside realize the magnitude of its mission. It has been simply ordered to produce the greatest air force in the world and it must do much more than to build fields, train pilots, develop tactics and formations. It must, for example, build thousands of airfields all over the country, training fields and auxiliary fields and emergency landing fields, and these are being leveled, built, and commissioned at an incredible rate of speed. It must establish schools for the various specialists and train instructors to train personnel. The Air Force is different from other military organizations. It must delegate its authority to the ground crew mechanic who is as responsible for the flight of a plane as the pilot. On the airfields barracks are going up. They are hardly completed before they are filled. On some fields the cadets live in tents until their barracks are finished.
    The Air Force must inspect and supervise the assembly lines that are turning out the planes, test them and accept them for the Service. It must clear the way for metals and supplies, engines and instruments. There can be no inferior part in an air force. The problems of supply alone are