Word: combatants
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Emphasis instead will be on training the hard nubbins of military strength that Army & Navy call task forces. Satisfied that the Army can operate in large bodies, can supply itself without snarling its communication lines, Lieut. General Lesley McNair, Commander of the Ground Forces, had decided to concentrate on combat refinements...
...Japan Keep It Up? When Japan began her Pacific march, she had perhaps 5,000 combat planes of all types, ages, conditions. She had no "Japanese Air Force"; she had two air services, completely integrated in the Army and Navy. Enthusiasts like Major Alexander de Seversky (see p. 52) would say in fact that Japan had no real air power; like the U.S., she had only air auxiliaries...
Some 2,500 of Japan's planes were "first-line" combat craft, and many of these 2,500 were technically inferior to corresponding U.S. and British types. The other 2,500 were mostly slow, ancient, underpowered, underarmed crates, some of which did not even have retractable landing gear (see cut). Furthermore, Japan has had very heavy losses - some 1,100 planes, undoubtedly including a high proportion of her best...
Nevertheless, Japan today probably has more planes - in over-all total - than she had in December. Reason: high though Jap losses have been to date, they are still slightly less than Japan's probable rate of aircraft production. Last autumn she was reportedly building about 300 combat planes per month, was aiming at 600 per month by the end of this year. But overall totals, even over-all replacements, are not what count in the kind of war Japan faces. What counts is whether her production is geared to replace the types which she is losing, as fast...
...They Do It? The Japanese had more than enough planes for the first stages of their war. In the entire Pacific area the Allies probably had fewer than 1,500 combat planes, and these were widely dispersed, in small batches. Concentrating one at a time on their chosen fronts, the Japanese always had more at any given point than the Allies...