Background Paper
On
Lieutenant General William H. Tunner 1. At the beginning of World War II, air mobility was an afterthought to most American military leaders. Future emphasis in air mobility would be caused by the success and leadership of Lieutenant General William H Tunner. He would take near impossible missions and respond by demonstrating the strength of this new part of airpower. General Tunner revolutionized air mobility and would lay the groundwork for airlift operations and the airlift doctrine. 2. General Tunner’s first step into making air mobility a strength of the Air Force came during the airlift operation in China or what many pilots called “The Hump”. The need for an airlift started when Japan had gained power and control throughout China during the early parts of World War II and blockaded all the roads. The only area left now to transport goods would be by air through the Himalayan Mountains. The United States took on this mission of supplying the Chinese to help defeat the Japanese and under the leadership of General Tunner success came after the first couple years. 3. Later that decade, a problem would arise in the city of Berlin, Germany. At the beginning of the Cold War, the Soviet Union would cut off West Berlin from all supply lines in order to send the city into starvation. The United States saw this potential takeover and feared the spread of communism into Berlin. Many people felt that supplying the city would be quite impossible. Seeing that General Tunner basically created the doctrine for airlifts, he would soon take control and apply the same techniques and ideas from “The Hump” to the “Berlin Airlift”. The success of how General Tunner ran the “Berlin Airlift” made the land blockade pointless and would result in the Soviets lifting the blockade. 4. Before General Tunner came around, air mobility had never