 October 9th, 1943, England, 8th Air Force Bomber Command. Inside the operation's war room, nerve center of the vast organization, which was directing daily attacks against target Germany, the commanding general's staff stood ready. Like the bombers on nearby fields, they waited for General Fred Anderson's briefing. Time for decision was at hand. Tomorrow's targets were about to be selected. General relied on a mountain of information from his intelligence and weather experts. What's the weather prospect today, Major? It looks like most of Germany will be pretty good, sir. But we have a warfront approaching from down here, which we do not expect to affect the bases until late in the evening. How's the weather at Anclam? At Anclam, sir, we expect 2 to 5 tenths of low cloud and small amounts of middle and high cloud above 18,000 feet, visibility 6 to 8 miles. How about Maryenburg? At Maryenburg, 2 to 4 tenths of low cloud, a little or no middle or high cloud, visibility 6 to 8 miles. What will it be at Danzig and Gdynia? At Danzig and Gdynia, sir, 2 to 5 tenths of low cloud, 2 to 4 tenths of high cloud above 23,000 feet, visibility in there about 5 miles. Give me the map of Anclam and the picture of the aircraft factory there. The possible factory. With two combat wings, Anclam with two combat wings, shipyards at Danzig with two combat wings, and a port facility at Gdynia with two combat wings. That will require a maximum effort. Maximum effort. This field order was flashed to 150,000 men and 600 aircraft. The mighty 8th Air Force was alerted. Because most of the bombers were going deeper than ever before, the plan was for the task forces to spread and thus divert German fighter defenses. Each route, though aimed at a vital target in the enemy's industrial heart, was carefully plotted to minimize enemy flak and fighter interference. General Bob Williams, 1st Division, tackled their part in the mission. Control point here at the control point here for the northern unit. Zero plus 40 minutes. From that timing, where will that put our northern force at the time of our southern force, ICIP? The northern force should be about the east coast of Denmark at that time, sir. It looks like we're going to catch all the fighters on the southern force, aren't we? Looks very much that way, sir. I think we'd better bend that route around so it's headed toward Berlin. If we can pin those German fighters down in Berlin until we can get started at home, they'll never catch us. Meanwhile, General Hodges' 2nd Division got ready. Time to go, Gary. That's fine. How many ships do we have tomorrow? Well, sir, a few to call, General. On our last mission, we had heavy battle damage, and now all those aircraft are repaired yet. Call up the wing commanders and have them put pressure on the groups to get their maintenance crews to work on these ships tonight and get every possible airplane on the line in the morning. The planning continued at General Russ Wilson's 3rd Division. Looks pretty good, sir. We're going to be right over a lake there for a good check point to turn. We're going in against the sun. The sun will be at our backs, sir. Defense isn't the target, sir. Major Frost, what about the flag defenses? Sir, the upper target, sir, is 24 guns. That approach is good. The lower target isn't defended by heavy guns. No heavy guns, whatever it might work. I'm not sure. At Combat Wing Operations, Colonel Kessler's unit plotted airplane takeoffs and assembly. Field order requires that we provide the 2nd Combat Wing and the 2nd Air Task Force. 89th Group will lead, 81st Group will be high, and 63rd Group will be low. That means that Colonel Whitton will lead the Combat Wing on this mission. The morning was turned into action. Pilots came for the word and the briefing calls. For some, it was their first mission. Most of us were veterans. Everyone was checked in. No strangers allowed. What went on here could be life or death in the air later. In a few minutes, we'd learn the nature, locale, and route of today's mission. Who was carrying the ball and what protective tactics we'd use. Once everyone settles down, the briefing's started. Half of the day is anxious. Specifically, you have to destroy the errato factory. We're doing a formation of variance work today. The group in the 764th will be low group. Honor command. Health has put out a special effort today, so let's give it time. The group CO's always had a few words. Men, the going's going to be rough. You're going to have to pull your neck in there and stay in there and pitch every minute. Now, gentlemen, miss the type of targets you don't want to have to go back after the second time. Remember that your biggest enemy is still the single-engine fighter plane. Now, you bombardiers, take your time in going in on your releases. Now, if you're getting any trouble up in this area, remember you're always going to swing. Get out of here and knock it. Now, it's closed over there. It could be rough. The whole thing will be too bad. And whether it's easy or rough, I'll be sitting out in front, taking the old words in. This is quite a show. After three hours, we had penetrated deep into Germany. So far, our tactics had paid off. We were getting through. Our liberators and fortresses followed the timetable of our flight plan and tight formations. As we approached our target, some of the Germans intercepted. But enemy fighters and enemy flak didn't stop us from getting to our objectives. Anklum, Gdynia, Danzig, Marionburg. All work in these German war plans came to a sudden and violent stop. On bombing the target, the group leader instantly called the bomber command. This command, in turn, promptly informed Ira Aker, the commanding general of the Eighth Air Force. This was a signal for the Eighth Fighter Command to put into action their part of the battle plan. At the British bases, more than 150 P-47s began to take off to escort the returning task forces. The Thunderbolts joined up with the bombers north of Holland. Immediately, enemy fighter activity ceased. From now on, it was a milk run. At the British bases, 145,000 men sweated out the mission. Fall over the field at dispersal areas, the control tower, the Red Cross. Everyone wondered how many would return. The Lili Marionburg Task Force was fighting more than mighty strong. Only two bombers missing from this group. The other task forces to Gdynia, Danzig and Anklum had suffered stiffer enemy pounding. Tactics had called for them to attract enemy fighters away from the main target. It was a calculated risk, but compared to Schwanford, losses were cut in half. One by one, the bombers set down. At long last, the flyers had returned home. Happy that they got back, our gunners celebrated their victories. Nearly 150 enemy planes destroyed. Although tension eased for the ground crews, the job of the flyers wasn't done. Before the airmen could rest, they were rushed to interrogation while their impressions and memories were still fresh. Every bit of information was needed for future planning. Three hours and 21 minutes ago, these men were over Anklum. What time did you go on the target? I wasn't 43 hours. It was in the 12,000 feet. Did you get your bounds on the target? Yeah. What about enemy fighter positions? Well, that's something that's really rare. Well, let's get some of the details. Well, they first jumped at the 1030s, and I just off the Danish coast. And how long will the attack continue? They stayed with us to the target, and until 1327. Then at 1345, we had another group of tanks that stayed until 1405. We had a couple more tanks, and the last one was the 1526, just off the Danish coast coming out. What type of enemy aircraft did you encounter? Well, from what I could see from the tail, they threw the book out. FW 190s, they mean 109s, 110s, 210s. Dorians, even J-87s and 88s. I knocked down two. They were making attacks about five o'clock level. Yeah, I saw them. One of them blew up in the air, and the other one went down in flames. Were any other guns fired at these planes? No, sir. These were live babies. Interrogation over, the cold facts were collected. Strike photos were processed. They revealed the primary target, the Marienberg-Fachwulf aircraft plant, almost completely destroyed. Only yesterday, it had been turning out half of Germany's FW 190 fighters. In fact, the concentration of bomb bursts was so great that General Half Arnold called it the finest example of precision bombing on record up to this time. Success was the result of scientific planning by an Air Force which knew its business. For two more years, the lessons of these maximum effort, long-distance missions were to be applied on an even greater scale over Germany and then Japan with the combined bomber and escort fighter strength of the growing United States Air Force.