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Military aviation. He believed it should become an independent armed service, and he dedicated his life to seeing that it did. Although Arnold was highly intelligent, he was intellectually undisciplined; thus he tended to endorse a variety of contradictory ideas in rushing to accomplish his goals. He was, on the one hand, astute enough to support the very long-range bomber, the B-29; he was, on the other, naive enough to see merit in what was derisively dubbed the “bats in the belfry” project to drop fire-bomb-carrying bats on Japanese cities.

The drive to complete a task, in spite of obstacles, was his hallmark. After three years at Rockwell Field, Spaatz assumed command of the 1st Bombardment Wing at March Field in Riverside, California. From California, Spaatz traveled back to the Potomac in 1933 where he served for two years as Chief of the Training and Operations Division in the Office of the Chief of the Air Corps (OCAC). In 1935 he received his first promotion in seventeen yearsto lieutenant colonel. With the promotion came orders to attend the Army Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas.

89 35 17 13 0 8 21 15 7 1 0 28 18 1 7 4 15 8 3 5 3 17 11 1 8 1 14 10 0 14 4 18 5 9 9 2 Compiled from the Official Reports of the Chief of the Army Air Service Corps. 12 5 4 4 2 9 26 10 13 3 19 9 9 11 4 8 13 9 15 12 3 9 13 14 12 3 6 3 8 3 9 2 0 1 8 1 6 7 3 2 3 1 1 3 21 17 3 9 9 SPAATZ AND THE AIRWAR IN EUROPE reinstated the award of ratings but for distinguished service instead of skill in aviation. Aside from the honor, the rating entitled Spaatz to a flight pay of 75 percent of base pay, an emolument he continued to draw even after the National Defense Act of 1920 limited all flight pay, except for distinguished Military Aviators, to 50 percent.