Northwest African Air Forces

From February 18, 1943, the Northwest African Air Forces (NAAF) under Lieutenant General Carl Spaatz became the largest and primary sub-command of MAC. The Casablanca planners modeled NAAF after the successful coordination of strategic, coastal, and tactical units of the Middle East Command under Tedder during the campaigns in Egypt and Libya in 1942. Accordingly, the Northwest African Air Forces had three major combined combat commands. • Northwest African Strategic Air Force (NASAF) under former 12th Air Force commander Major General James H. Doolittle, included: the former XII Bomber Command of B-17 Flying Fortresses, No. 205 (Heavy Bomber) Group's bombardment force consisting of four wings (10–12 British Commonwealth bomber squadrons) and several heavy bomber elements from the USAAF Ninth Air Force; • Northwest African Coastal Air Force (NACAF), initially under (acting commander) Group Captain G. G. Barrett and, soon afterwards, Air Vice-Marshal Hugh Lloyd: comprised No. 201 (Naval Co-operation) Group's anti-shipping coastal force (10 squadrons: Greek, Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), South African Air Force (SAAF) and Royal Air Force (RAF); and • Northwest African Tactical Air Force (NATAF) under Acting Air Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham, including Air Headquarters, Western Desert's tactical fighter command (including the USAAF Desert Air Task Force consisting of the United States 57th Fighter and 12th Bombardment Groups) and XII Air Support Command units. The following support commands were also assigned to NAAF: • Northwest African Air Service Command (NAASC) under Major General Delmar H. Dunton; • Northwest African Training Command (NATC) under Brigadier General John K. Cannon; • Northwest African Photographic Reconnaissance Wing (NAPRW) under Colonel Elliott Roosevelt, the US president's son; and • Northwest African Troop Carrier Command (NATCC) initially under Colonel Ray Dunn and later under Brigadier General Paul L. Williams. ==Operations==

To foster cooperation between the British RAF and the American USAAF in particular, the commands listed above and their various sub-commands were intended to have a commanding officer from one air force and a deputy from the other air force. In keeping with this plan, Spaatz's deputy of NAAF was Air Vice-Marshal James Robb who handled operations. In particular, the flexibility between Coningham's WDAF and the 8th Army has been contrasted with the more rigid relationship between the Luftwaffe and German ground forces. The United States 12th Air Force, the largest air force ever assembled soon after its inception several months earlier, ceased to exist in the new MAC organizational structure. The 12th simply disappeared as its groups were distributed among the various new NAAF commands above. The sole reference to the 12th Air Force among the higher tier commands was Brigadier General Edwin House's XII Air Support Command which along with Air Vice Marshal Harry Broadhurst's Western Desert Air Force, Air Commodore Laurence Sinclair's Tactical Bomber Force, and Air Commodore Sir Kenneth Cross' No. 242 Group, became subordinate commands of Coningham's NATAF. Later, XII Air Support Command became even less obvious in the MAC structure when it was detached to No. 242 Group. Prior to the invasion of Sicily (Operation Husky) in July 1943, No. 242 Group was assigned to Lloyd's NACAF on Malta. NAAF was the first official command based upon the "tri-force" model. Successfully practiced and developed during the Tunisian, Pantellerian, Sicilian, and Italian campaigns, the tripartite model was retained by subsequent Allied air forces for D-Day Normandy and D-Day Southern France. Even some of today's air forces consider the historical precedents of the "tri-force" model. ==Termination & reorganization of NAAF==

On December 10, 1943, MAC was disbanded and the Allied air forces in the MTO were again reorganized as the Mediterranean Allied Air Forces (MAAF) with Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder as Air Commander-in-Chief. In mid-January 1944, Lieutenant General Ira Eaker took over MAAF when Eisenhower chose Tedder to oversee air operations and planning for the Normandy Landings. The new MAAF organization contained separate strategic, coastal, and tactical air forces under a single unified structure: • Mediterranean Allied Strategic Air Force (MASAF) under Major General Nathan Twining; • Mediterranean Allied Coastal Air Force (MACAF) under Air Vice-Marshal Hugh Lloyd; and • Mediterranean Allied Tactical Air Force (MATAF) under Major General John K. Cannon. ==Notes==