Posted on 12/25/2012 2:03:49 PM PST by virgil283
"...I was surprised to find out that LeMay wasn’t at all the man I thought he was … and I didn’t think he got a fair shake in history. Here is a man who has been marginalized and even vilified as this mad bomber yearning for a nuclear exchange with the Soviets. Hollywood helped solidify that negative image with Dr. Strangelove ..and he became a favorite target for journalists beginning in the 1960s. In truth, the real LeMay couldn’t have been further from the crazy brute that he’s been made out to be. He was a sober, strategic realist, who cared deeply for the men who served under him and for the country he defended. LeMay was perhaps the most brilliant military strategist this nation has ever produced – not my words but those of the late Robert S. McNamara. And LeMay was brave. He put his own life at risk insisting on flying the lead bomber on every dangerous mission over Europe. He was one of the most influential factors in our victory in the Pacific Theater. And if that weren’t enough, LeMay had a third act that equaled the first two, helping to win the Cold War by turning the Strategic Air Command into the most efficient and deadliest military force in history that kept the Soviets in check for decades. .... ..On his very first mission, LeMay ordered everyone to fly straight in with no deviation so they could hit the targets. The men were horrified. One pilot stood up at the pre-flight briefing and said they’d all be slaughtered. LeMay looked straight at him and, showing the most brilliant form of leadership, simply said: “No, I think we can take it and to prove it, I’ll fly the lead plane.”
(Excerpt) Read more at frontpagemag.com ...
Bump.
for a fact...the LeMay and Goldwater stories are 1000 percent true as well
bttt
Bump!
Developer of the Strategic Air Command, Gen. Curtis LeMay, provided many enjoyable (if not apocryphal) quotes, such as at a Senate hearing when asked why, with already enough nuclear bombs to reduce the Soviet Union to cinders, he still wanted more nuclear weapons, LeMay replied, “I want to see the cinders dance.”
FYI.
“I do not wish to have it pointed out to me by some “whiz kid” at this late stage of the game, that World War II was a colossal mistake , an international misunderstanding for which the United States was proportionately responsible. World War II was nothing of the kind. It was an event wherein the military giants of those several Axis states decided that they could get away with an incredible land grab, a nation grab, a super-Napoleonic defacement of a world-sized map. They did this with the enthusiasm of their nationals behind them. In minor dissension may have sounded the voices of a few ardent patriots and heroic philosophers; but those were not the majority. An horrific chorus shouted, ‘Duce!’, or ‘Banzai!’ or ‘Heil Hitler!’ Eventually, because of the sacrifices endured by our men and the entire populations of Allied countries, the enemy went down to defeat. Enemy cities were pulverized or fried to a crisp. It was something they asked for and something they got. In reverse fashion, if we keep listening to the gospel of apology and equivocation which all too many politicians and savants are preaching today in the United States, we will be asking for the same thing. And in time, may achieve it. Like witch doctors, defense intellectuals have created jargon which tends to becloud understanding. I submit that military strategy and subsequent national defense policies are understandable if clearly presented. Moreover, the average citizen must be familiar with these subjects, because, through his franchise, he makes the most fundamental and far-reaching defense decisions.”
General Curtis LeMay – 1965
Lemay understood good and evil, and acted accordingly.
Read his biography. It was great.
all American military personnel were also targets of
the 1960s Marxist-Alinsky campus radical, psycho spoiled brats who were celebrated in the establishment MSM as the most intelligent generation ever!. They are now arguably that very establishment that praised them and they hold themselves and their ideological issue in even higher regard.
As pillars of the Establishment today they can now direct the MSM to attack whomever they please in addition to the American military.. rarely necessary of course because the MSM are also 1960s Marxist-Alinsky campus radical, psycho spoiled brats and ideological issue of same.
Among them was General Curtis LeMay who IIRC smoked cigars and was reported to make sure that he sat next to Taylor in meetings knowing that Taylor hated tobacco smoke.
Save for later
Thank you for the link a very interesting man..Will check out book..
LeMay was a tangible threat to the Soviet Union, which had long been very scared of America’s bomber fleet, because from the end of WWII to about the mid-1960s, nuclear missiles were just not good enough, or common enough, to rely on.
So the Soviets told their American traitors to destroy LeMay with character assassination.
bttt
***Developer of the Strategic Air Command,***
I remember living in Roswell NM in 1959 and seeing the B-47s taking off one right after another ever few weeks.
When I later was stationed there at Walker AFB the B-52s did not fly quite as often. The ALERT pads were always ready and every SAC base had two aircraft in the air with h-bombs at all times.
After a collision with a KC-135 Tanker, flying the two bombers with H-bombs was stopped.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.