The Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress was, for a long time, known as one of the iconic symbols of American air power during World War II – a tough aircraft that was piloted by brave crews whose stories have become myth. However, the myth behind the myth is a more complex story, one that is perplexing with design compromises, misguided strategy, horrible death, and the incredible giving of the people who took it up in the air.
When it entered service in 1935, the B-17 was already looking past its prime. Based on ideas hatched during the 1920s and early 1930s, it wasn’t as much of a long-range bomber as the Army Air Corps had hoped. In fact, insiders regarded the newer Consolidated B-24 Liberator as an upgrade over the B-17, with its heavier payload and more efficient wing design. But the B-17’s smooth handling and capacity to fly at higher altitudes won it a loyal following among pilots, particularly those still familiarizing themselves with biplanes.
Its emergence to the forefront was as much a matter of timing as engineering. When tensions mounted in Europe, President Franklin Roosevelt’s appeal for military expansion achieved mass production of American bombers—the B-17 among them—before the U.S. officially entered the war. The Flying Fortress was set to command the nation’s strategic bombing campaign by the time it entered the war.
That effort was based on a radical concept formulated at the Air Corps Tactical School: daylight precision bombing. The theory was that large numbers of heavily armed bombers, flying in close formations, could blast strategic industrial objectives with great precision—paralyzing an enemy’s capacity to fight a war. In practice, this doctrine would turn out to be ambitious and expensive.
The first real combat trial of the B-17 was actually not with American crews, but rather with the British. The Royal Air Force was given several B-17Cs in 1941 with the expectation that they could carry out deep raids into Germany. The outcome, however, was not as anticipated. In their first mission, the aircraft were plagued by a series of mechanical failures, the bombs did not release properly, and the targeting was off. Consequently, the RAF immediately ruled out the airplane as a suitable aircraft for its needs and focused instead on other bombers.
These were also the bitter lessons of the American crews. The initial flights over the occupied France were somewhat manageable, but problems began to surface when the raids got deeper into Germany. It was then that the proponents of daylight bombing revealed their falsehoods. Even though B-17 wings were heavily armed with various types of defensive guns, the formations still fell easy prey to coordinated Luftwaffe attacks, especially after the escort fighters had to go back due to running out of fuel. The losses grew, and the legend of the self-defending bomber was at the same time rapidly dismantled.
The most dramatic incident occurred in 1943. The combined raid on Regensburg and Schweinfurt in August led to the destruction of 60 out of 376 planes that were sent off, as well as a large number of others being put out of action. The subsequent Schweinfurt raid in October, also known as “Black Thursday,” caused 60 of the 229 bombers that took part to go down, and more than 600 airmen to die or become missing. The devastation stopped the heavily armed bomber from flying counterattacks for some time and triggered a rethinking of the strategy.
One of the last resort measures that was taken was the attempt by the engineers to build “escort bombers” like the YB-40, which were supposed to be heavily armed with additional guns, but the design was awkward and inefficient. However, the real solution came with the P-51 Mustang, a long-range fighter that could go with the bombers to their targets and back safely. From that moment onwards, the Allied bombing campaigns were able to continue without such heavy losses as before.
Even outside combat areas, the risks were enormous. The American air forces grew explosively, with tens of thousands of young men hurried through training programs with little experience on high-speed planes. Mechanical brbreakdownsbad weather, and pilot errors created thousands of fatal crashes. For many crews, the war was finished before they even encountered the enemy.
Nevertheless, the B-17 established itself as tough through thousands of tales of bomber cripples making it home against impossible odds. Although both the B-24 and the B-17 could be destroyed by one fortunate hit, the stories of battered Fortresses limping back across the Channel entered into its lasting mythos.
By the end of the war, the B-17 was no longer an airplane—it was an emblem of American perseverance and sacrifice. But its story is not one of heroism only. It is also a tale of how ambitious Air Force theories of airpower ran up against the brutal facts of modern war. The conclusions drawn from its missions—about strategy, technology, and what the human body could endure—would influence the course of aviation for years to come.