Draft:James Barclay Knapp

MAJOR GENERAL JAMES B. KNAPP

August 13, 1915 - February 18, 1999

Major General James B. Knapp was commander of Chanute Technical Training Center, Chanute Air Force Base, Ill. He was born in 1915, in Macomb, Ill. He graduated from Blandinsville High School in 1932 and entered Transylvania University, Lexington, Ky., where he studied one year. He returned to Illinois for two years where he attended Western Illinois State Teachers College, majoring in chemistry. He was appointed to the U.S. Military Academy, West Point, N.Y., in 1935 and graduated in June 1939 with a commission as second lieutenant and a bachelor of science degree in engineering. He completed flying training at Kelly Field, Texas, in 1940.

The next two years he served as commander of a flying training detachment at the Army Air Corps Primary Flying School in Stamford, Texas. During World War II, General Knapp served in Italy with the Fifteenth Air Force as squadron commander, group deputy commander, and then commander. He completed 43 combat missions with a total of 303 flying hours. In 1944 he was assigned as chief of operations, Mediterranean Allied Air Forces, to coordinate and plan air actions of the Atomic Energy Commission.

In September 1945 he returned to the United States and was assigned to Headquarters Army Air Forces in Washington, D.C., where he served as staff planning officer and later as chief, Strategy Branch of War Plans Division, Office of the Assistant Chief of Air Staff for Plans. From July 1947 to July 1948 he was assistant to chief of Plans Division, Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, Headquarters U.S. Air Force. He next was executive secretary, Military Liaison Committee to the Atomic Energy Commission.

In June 1949, General Knapp went to Chatham Air Force Base, Ga., as deputy commander and then commander, 2d Bombardment Group. In June 1951 he was assigned to Second Air Force, Barksdale Air Force Base, La., as staff officer and then director of operations. He entered the Air War College, Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala., in August 1952.

General Knapp went to Goose Air Base, Labrador, in August 1953, as base commander and in April 1957 assumed command of the 4082d Strategic Wing.

He returned to the United States in June 1957 and was appointed director of civil engineering for Strategic Air Command Headquarters, Offutt Air Force Base, Neb. In July 1963 he assumed command of Sixteenth Air Force with headquarters at Torrejon, Spain. He returned to Headquarters Strategic Air Command, in October 1964, as director of personnel and in July 1966 became chief of staff. From January 1969 to August 1969 he served as senior member, Military Armistice Commission, United Nations Command, at Seoul, Korea. General Knapp assumed command, in August 1969, of Chanute Technical Training Center, Chanute Air Force Base, Ill. His military decorations include the Distinguished Service Medal, Silver Star, Legion of Merit with two oak leaf clusters, Distinguished Flying Cross with oak leaf cluster, Air Medal with four oak leaf clusters, Presidential Unit Citation Emblem, and French Croix de Guerre.

During the Second World War, on 20 October 1944, James Barclay Knapp in command of the 451st bomb group had the task of destroying the Breda factories in Sesto San Giovanni. At 7:58 am the bombers of the 451st Bomb Group took off from the runway of Castelluccio dei Sauri airport, near Foggia. The attack plan envisaged reaching, with a large bypass, the initial reference point, located approximately 4 km west of the target, to carry out a 22° turn to the left and find ourselves above the Breda factories. To avoid being an easy target for anti-aircraft fire, the attack was divided into two successive waves. The action of the first wave was unsuccessful, due to a short circuit in the launch command of the "B-24" formation leader, who suddenly and prematurely activated the launch procedure, immediately imitated by the remaining pilots of the following formation. The bombs, fortunately, ended up in the open countryside without causing any casualties.

The second wave, probably due to the incorrect transcription or interpretation of the coordinates in the code, once it reached the initial point above Milan, turned 22° to the right instead of to the left. By the time the error was detected, it was too late to change direction and a second alignment flight was impossible. The load of bombs, now all primed, prevented, for safety reasons, the loaded bomber from landing at the base; Knapp, instead of getting rid of the load by dropping the 342 500-pound bombs during the return journey over the Cremonese countryside or in the Adriatic Sea, decided to get rid of them immediately, dropping them on the town below.

At 11.29am the towns of Gorla and Precotto were hit by almost 80 tonnes of explosives.

Most of the bombs reached the Milanese neighborhood of Gorla. The damage was extensive and there were numerous victims, although a large part of the population had reached the air-raid shelters, alerted by the first alarm at 11.14 am and the next at 11.24 am. One of the bombs, fatally, hit the stairwell of the "Francesco Crispi" elementary school, just as children and school staff were going down to reach the building's underground shelter; 184 children, 14 teachers, the school director, 4 janitors and a health worker died.

In the city of Milan, on that 20 October, there were 614 victims pulled from the rubble, as well as a few hundred injured.

What happened in Gorla is surely enough to qualify this man as a war criminal, but he still have all his medals and what he did is never mentioned on his unglorious biography, despite the fact that he choose deliberately to bomb innocents italian people instead of dropping the bomb far from the city, he gave order to let it fall on a school full of kids.

I think someone have to mention this facts and call spade a spade

https://www.comune.milano.it/web/milano-memoria/-/80-anniversario-della-strage-dei-piccoli-martiri-di-gorla

References

•  This article incorporates public domain material from MAJOR GENERAL JAMES B. KNAPP. US Air Force.