The Air Corps Tactical School, also known as ACTS and "the Tactical School", was a military professional development school for officers of the United States Army Air Service and United States Army Air Corps, the first such school in the world.Miller, Donald L. (2006). Masters of the Air: America's Bomber Boys Who Fought the Air War Against Nazi Germany, New York: Simon & Schuster. , p. 38. Created in 1920 at Langley Field, Virginia, it relocated to Maxwell Field, Alabama, in July 1931. Instruction at the school was suspended in 1940, anticipating the entry of the United States into World War II, and the school was dissolved shortly after. ACTS was replaced in November 1942 by the Army Air Force School of Applied Tactics.
In addition to the training of officers in more than 20 areas of military education, the school became the doctrine development center of the Air Corps, and a preparatory school for Air Corps officers aspiring to attendance at the U.S. Army's Command and General Staff College. The motto of the Air Corps Tactical School was Proficimus More Irretenti—"We Make Progress Unhindered by Custom".
The Air Corps Tactical School was notable as the birthplace of the Army Air Forces doctrine of daylight precision bombing. This doctrine held that a campaign of daylight air attacks against critical targets of a potential enemy's industrial infrastructure, using long-range bombers heavily armed for self-defense, could defeat an enemy nation even though its army and navy remained intact. The Tactical School, in formulating the doctrine, rejected the idea of attacking civilians.Griffith, Charles (1999). The Quest: Haywood Hansell and American Strategic Bombing in World War II. Air University Press , pp. 42.
Four former instructors of the school, the core of a group known as the "Bomber Mafia", were grouped together in the Air War Plans Division to produce the two war-winning plans—AWPD-1 and AWPD-42—based on the doctrine of precision daylight bombing that guided the wartime expansion and deployment of the Army Air Forces.
In a broader sense, the strategic bombing doctrine, adapted by factors encountered during combat, was also the foundation for the final separation of the Air Force from the Army as a military service independent of and equal to the other services. In 1946 the AAF created Air University to carry on the work and traditions of the ACTS.
Background
At the end of World War I, observation remained the main role of the Air Service. However, air combat and limited bombardment operations indicated to veterans of the Air Service, including Brig. Gen. Billy Mitchell, that while ideally the service should be separate from the Army, it at the least should be centralized under an Air Service commander with some missions independent of direct support of troops. In reorganizing the post-war Army, the Armed Forces Reorganization Act of 1920 (41 Stat. 759) rebuked these ideas but did establish the Air Service as a statutory entity (previously it had existed by executive order only) and assigned it status as a "combatant arm of the line."Finney, Robert T. (1955). USAF Historical Studies No. 100: History of the Air Corps Tactical School, Center for Air Force History, March 1955 edition, as are all references listed, pp. 4–5.
The Air Service followed the precedent of the other combat arms and began planning for its own service schools. An "Air Service School of Application" for technical training in aeronautical engineering, similar to the Ordnance School of Application at Sandy Hook, New Jersey, was set up at McCook Field, and began its first class 10 November 1919.Laubenthal, Capt. Sanders A. (1982) From Huffman Prairie to the Moon: The History of Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, AFLC, US Government Printing Office, p. 399. Maj. Gen. Charles Menoher, Director of Air Service, wrote the War Department in October 1919 for permission to establish a tactical school at Langley Field, Virginia, to train field grade officers in the operation and tactics of the Air Service as a requirement for higher command or staff work.Finney, p. 5.
On 25 February 1920, the War Department authorized the Air Service to establish its service schools. In addition to six pilot and advanced pilot training schools, and two technical training schools, an Air Service School was planned. It proposed to host courses for enlisted personnel as balloon observers, balloon mechanics, and aerial photography, but its main course was to be the Field Officers Course.Finney, pp. 5–6.
Langley Field, 1920–1931
Air Service Field Officers School Major Thomas DeWitt Milling was assigned as officer-in-charge of the Field Officers Course at the new school and sent to Langley in July 1920 to set it up. War Department General Order No. 18 authorized the school on 14 August 1920.Reither, Joseph. Army Air Forces Historical Study No. 13: The Development of Tactical Doctrines at AAFSAT and AAFTAC. 1944, Air Force Historical Research Agency, Maxwell AFB, Alabama, p. 6. The balloon courses were split off into a separate school in a different area of Langley and the Air Service School was renamed the Air Service Field Officers School on 10 February 1921,Air University Chronology 1920s–1930s after its primary function.Finney, p. 6, and note 18, p. 44. The Air Service ordered 17 officers to Langley, eight as students and nine as instructors, although several officers swapped roles and some instructors were students as well.Finney, p. 6. The 1920–1921 class opened on 1 November 1920, and although scheduled to last nine months, was concluded in May when both students and instructors were assigned to the 1st Provisional Air Brigade, as part of the experimental bombing of captured warships by the Air Service and the United States Navy. 11 officers, including four instructors, graduated the first course. The second class, beginning in October 1921, was devoted to the further training of instructors, the creation of a sound administrative system, and development of a well-rounded course curriculum.
In the first two classes, despite the school's title and function, only six of the first 23 graduates were field grade officers. A board reviewing all service schools of the United States Army observed that the Field Officers School had a course load that in other branches of the Army was distributed among several schools. Because all other Air Service schools were technical training in nature, the board recommended that the school be opened to all air service officers regardless of rank. Accordingly, Army regulations changed the name of the school to that of Air Service Tactical School on 8 November 1922. With the passage of the Air Corps Act of 1926, the school again changed its name, becoming the Air Corps Tactical School on 2 July 1926.Reither, p. 6.
While at Langley, the ACTS was hampered by a chronic shortage of instructors, caused by a lack of policy within the Army for filling vacancies despite a rapid turnover in staff in the first three years. School administrators were forced to double as instructors. The situation was somewhat ameliorated in August 1924 when the Chief of the Air Service authorized extended duty for instructors, most of whom afterwards served four-year tours on the faculty, with an overlap between incoming and outgoing staff. Between 1925 and 1929 the number of instructors gradually doubled to 16 but even that number proved insufficient to research the vast collection of aviation literature the school's library was collecting to establish doctrine.Finney, p. 10.
Despite school recommendations to the contrary, class size gradually increased, reaching 40 students by 1931.Finney, p. 11. The first student from a branch other than the Air Service (an infantry officer) attended ASTS in 1923–1924. This became standard when the 1926–1927 class had five officers representing the other combat branches of the United States Army and three from the United States Marine Corps assigned as students.Finney, p. 12.
The functioning of the school was also handicapped by a lack of permanent facilities, especially in quarters, and the school did not have a permanent academic building. When the five-year expansion program outlined in the Air Corps Act of 1926 failed to address these problems, and the creation of new units at Langley interrupted the functioning of the practical flying course, the Air Service began seeking a new location for the Tactical School.Finney, p. 14.
The 1930–1931 class was the last at Langley. In its eleven years at Langley, the Tactical School graduated 221 students.
Tactical School curriculum The academic curriculum was standardized in 1922 by the Army's board tasked with preparing "programs of instruction" for all Army schools. 1,345 hours of instruction in 20 subjects, taught over a nine-month period beginning on or about 1 September of each school year, included approximately 900 hours of tactics, including those of other services and combined arms tactics, although more than half (480 hours) were devoted to air tactics in observation, bombardment, pursuit, and attack aviation. Approximately 290 hours involved technical subjects, including aeronautical engineering, armament and gunnery, navigation, meteorology, and photography, and 150 to administrative studies, covering staff duties, combat orders, organization of the Army, military and international law, supply and courses in equitation and stable management.Finney, p. 7.
The curriculum was altered in July 1923 by the newly created Director of Instruction, Capt. Earl Naiden, cutting the academic course by 500 hours to 845 total hours. 450 hours of the cuts came from the various tactics subjects, although the equitation courses were also eliminated, and all academic courses were scheduled in mornings.Finney, p. 8. Naiden added courses in the history of the Air Service and map reading to the academics, and a 126-hour afternoon course in practical flying, instituted to provide refresher training to pilots but required of all students, including those of non-aviation branches. The course structure remained the same until 1939, with changes only in individual course subjects, averaging 25 hours per week of classroom study and 3.7 hours weekly of flying.
The first printed texts covering air tactics replaced mimeographed texts in 1924. This development of the tactics portion of the school led to increased emphasis, and in 1925 aeronautical engineering was eliminated from the curriculum. Theoretical use of airpower was first advanced in 1928, and beginning in 1929 a new course was taught at the end of each class, "The Air Force", coordinating all air topics covered during the year.Finney, pp. 12–13.
Army regulations also made the commander of the 2nd Wing, as the base commander at Langley, the commandant of the Tactical School. However, during its first four years this caused little disruption as Milling, first as officer in charge and then as assistant commandant, remained in actual charge of the school. In 1924 Maj. Oscar Westover became the first commandant to exercise control over school activities. The assistant commandant then became responsible for academics, assisted by the director of instruction, directors of the individual academic departments, and the school secretary (formerly the school adjutant).
Course instruction assumed a pattern combining both theory and practical instruction. Subjects were generally scheduled in blocks, particularly tactics, beginning with those of other branches and services, along with logistics and staff functions, from the beginning of each class until December. The courses in air tactics followed, described by one student as coming with "bewildering rapidity."Finney, p. 22.