Eighty years ago this week the Allies demonstrate air superiority both over Europe and the Pacific

 

The allied air forces launched Operation Argument, a series of maximum effort air raids on Germany, better know by its American nickname "Big Week". The damage from the bombing was of debatable value but the operation inflicted grievous casualties on the Luftwaffe. P-51 fighters now available had sufficient range to escort bombers to the heart of Germany and back. The Germans lost at least 100 pilots and perhaps 300 aircraft. The USAAF lost 226 heavy bombers and 28 fighters, with over 2,000 personnel. The Americans could afford the losses but the Germans could not. Big Week was a turning point in the battle for air superiority vital to undertaking the invasion of Europe.

A USN  task force of five fleet and four light carriers delivered a series of massive attacks on the major  Japanese base of Truk in the Caroline Islands. For the loss of 25 aircraft the Americans destroyed ten times as many Japanese aircraft and sank six warships and around thirty other vessels including irreplaceable oilers.

The British government suffered an unexpectedly large defeat in the latest of the series of by-elections that it lost. Alderman White, standing as an independent in West Derbyshire, achieved a 4,561 vote majority over the government candidate, Conservative Lord Hartington. White was backed by the Common Wealth Party which focused popular opposition to the coalition government.

The health minister, Henry Willink, presented a White Paper that set out the governement's proposals for a National Health Service. It embodied the simple principle that all forms of health care would be provided free of charge. There would be no compulsion to use the service; people would be free to choose their doctor.