“Frigate birds?” his adjutant had inquired.
“Frigate birds, my eye!” the general had retorted. “Those are enemy aircraft and they’ve caught us flat-footed.”
Our own high-rankers, while appreciating the tactical skill Bull Reeves had shown, had entirely missed the implications of his accomplishment. While the Army Air Service had been talking air power, the Navy had created the first American strategic air force, not one riveted to shore bases but one roving the high seas—on the backs of the fleet! Yet if this revolutionary development was lost upon most Americans, it was not lost upon our potential enemies, the Japanese.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Another Turning
Admiral Moffett did not miss the opportunity, afforded him by the Saratoga’s performance, to press for his reappointment as Chief of the Bureau of Aeronautics. He countered front office maneuvers in the Navy Department through adroit handling of the political angle at which he was past master. Someone on the Naval Affairs Committee let the Secretary know that the admiral’s reappointment for a third term was favored by that committee; then someone on the Appropriations Committee inquired when his nomination might be expected—and lo, the whole house of cards collapsed.
The performance of the Saratoga’s planes created a front-page sensation; The New York Times handled the story exceptionally. Hanson Baldwin, himself a Naval Academy man steeped in the Mahan tradition, was on the scene, and went out with us on several demonstrations arranged for fleet officers and distinguished visitors. Charles A. Lindbergh, then at Panama in connection with Pan American Airways’ first mail hop from Panama to Miami, spent several days on board the Saratoga.
Instead of quartering him in the admiral’s cabin, we berthed him down in the wardroom with the squadron pilots and passed the word around that he should be treated like any other visiting Army file. However, since his first act had been to request permission to take off and land on the ship, and further, since approval of his request might convey the impression that there was no mystery attached to being a naval aviator—especially a carrier pilot—I was designated to chaperon him during flight operations and diplomatically to fend him off.
We were standing together on the bridge of the Saratoga, watching the evolutions on deck. The very precision of the landings and take-offs was a delight, and the smooth teamwork of the deck crews was breathtaking, even to those who had grown up with the development. Lindbergh, enthusiastic as a kid with a toy airplane, kept up a running fire of questions as to the whys and wherefores of everything. He was particularly curious about the air tactics, and kept Wagner and the admiral busy answering searching questions. Lindbergh’s eyes gleamed and his boyish grin widened as the admiral held forth as only he could do.
It was after the operations had been concluded and we were heading back to port that Lindbergh popped the question that was uppermost in his mind.
“Why won’t you let me land on board?” he asked abruptly.