Courtesy Photo | Maj. Gen. Clayton Bissell (left) with his predecessor, Maj. Gen. George V. Strong...... read more read more
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by Michael E. Bigelow, INSCOM Command Historian
On February 7, 1944, Maj. Gen. Clayton L. Bissell succeeded Maj. Gen. George V. Strong as the Army’s assistant chief of staff, G-2. Bissell would remain the Army G-2 for the remainder of World War II.
An Army Air Force officer, the 48-year-old Bissell joined the Army in August 1917. Commissioned as a first lieutenant a few months later, he trained as a pilot in Canada and Texas before sailing for Europe. After arriving in France in July 1918, he flew over the Western Front. By the end of World War I, he had shot down six enemy planes to qualify as an ace.
Shortly after the war, Bissell served as aide for Brig. Gen. William Mitchell, the adamant but volatile advocate of air power, from 1921-1925. Afterwards, Bissell served in a variety of command, staff, and instructional positions in the Army Air Corps. When World War II broke out, he was a lieutenant colonel serving with the Army’s War Plans Division.
In January 1942, Lt. Gen. Joseph W. Stilwell took now-Colonel Bissell to serve as his chief aviation officer in the China Burma India Theater. When the 10th Air Force was organized in August 1942, Bissell became its commander as a brigadier general. Operating out of India, he struggled to support the effort against the Japanese. In the process, a personal feud developed with Brig. Gen. Claire Chennault, commander of the air forces in China, over tactics, support, and just about everything else. The discord became so intense eventually Stilwell had to agree to send Bissell home in August 1943.
Within a month of his return, Bissell became the Army Air Forces A-2. His new boss, General Henry H. Arnold, saw him as “an excellent staff officer who carefully worked out every operation before he undertook it, or said he could not do it.” After several months as A-2, Bissell transferred to the Army G-2 as the replacement for General Strong, who was approaching retirement.
Before he assumed the G-2 reins, however, Bissell joined Assistant Secretary of War John J. McCloy’s committee to recommend structural improvements in the G-2. Since 1941, the G-2 struggled to balance its duties to analyze and disseminate intelligence with its need to direct and execute collection of information. McCloy’s committee wanted to reinstitute the Military Intelligence Service (MIS) that would collect and disseminate intelligence while sharing analytical duties with the G-2’s staff. The study also endorsed a different methodology for processing information into intelligence. Unfortunately, this reorganization was implemented just as the Army was heading into the all-important Normandy campaign.
Nevertheless, the G-2 maintained its productivity, largely due to the efforts of the individual analysts and researchers. Through their work, the G-2 continued to put out its array of products to the Army. Meanwhile, Bissell hammered out agreements and procedures so the G-2 and MIS could effectively function with allied, joint, and theater intelligence groups. To assist, he issued a directive that guided reporting from the field as well as standardized instructions for the MIS.
As the war in Europe approached its end in the spring of 1945, Bissell began to look more at the Pacific theater. For example, the MIS’s Intelligence Bulletins and Special Series, which had largely emphasized the German army, began to focus on Japanese army organization and operations. Bissell also established the Pacific Military Intelligence Research Section at Fort Ritchie, Maryland to translate and study captured Japanese documents.
Moreover, Bissell worked to improve inter-service relationships. Despite his reputation as a contentious personality, he was largely successful. His experience as an air force officer helped improve relationships between the G-2 and the A-2, especially with the bombing campaign against Japan and the use of signals intelligence to build an aerial order of battle. Significantly, he worked with the Navy to create a joint board to collaborate over communication intelligence.
Although Bissell’s alleged suppression of evidence in May 1945 of Soviet responsibility for the Katyn massacre of Polish officers cast a shadow over his service at Army G-2, he proved a capable G-2. During his tenure, he refocused G-2 efforts toward Japan and established a trend to actively cooperate with other intelligence agencies.
| Date Taken: | 02.06.2023 |
| Date Posted: | 02.06.2023 10:28 |
| Story ID: | 437899 |
| Location: | FORT HUACHUCA, ARIZONA, US |
| Web Views: | 129 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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