There was absolutely no doubt in their minds who'd win the war. Their fathers and uncles had landed in France in 1917 with the same certain knowledge and the same cocky attitude. The young pilots of the newly established Eighth Air Force bomber squadrons knew they'd win the war, and they knew exactly how they'd win it.

Their Flying Fortresses would bomb in broad daylight from high altitude, hitting the pickle barrel from 30,000 ft (9,144 m), and shooting down any Luftwaffe pilots foolish enough to tangle with a bomber bristling with .50-caliber machine guns.

Those untested crews reflected popular opinion back home, and a simplistic view of the air war against Germany that was held by their commanders, and even by most high-level brass in England and in Washington.

The success of their first mission against the railway yards at Rouen-Sotteville reinforced their opinions. Later missions further emphasized the ease with which the B-17s flew to the target, dropped their lethal loads, and flew home again. They were escorted part of the way to the target, and partway home, by RAF Spitfire squadrons, because they lacked their own escort-t fighters. They'd gone to Abbeville, Amiens, Courtrai, Meaulte and Rotterdam, in eight missions with no losses, and even the skeptical RAF officers observing their operations seemed to be coming around to the American way of thinking.

From the dozen B-17s dispatched against Sotteville, their strength had grown to 37 on the second mission to those yards. Two B-17s, their first combat losses, were shot down by German fighters on the 6 September 1942 mission against the Potez factory at Meaulte. They went back again on 2 October, with more than 400 escorting fighters, and this time got off loss-free.

It began to look relatively easy. The post-strike photos showed fair to good bomb patterns; losses were low, and the weather cooperated.

There appeared to he some truth in the bombast, but Air Marshal Arthur T. Harris, commanding the RAF's Bomber Command, was not convinced. He was inclined to believe his own experience.