Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress Units of the Mediterranean Theater of Operations

Initially equipped with the B-17F Flying Fortress, the 97th and 301st Bombardment Groups were flown from airfields in England to Algiers and Oran, Algeria in November 1942 after the Operation Torch landings.

Its heavy bombardment units (B-17 and B-24) were joined with those of the Ninth Air Force which had been based in Libya and which was moving without personnel or equipment to be re-established as a tactical organization in England.

[1] From their bases in Southern Italy, the Fortresses engaged in long-range strategic bombardment attacks against the enemy in Austria, the Balkans, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, France, Germany, Greece, Poland, and Romania.

Most combat airfields were temporary wartime facilities quickly constructed with pierced-steel planking runways and parking areas, with tents used for personnel quarters and a few wooden buildings used for operations.

In Tunisia and Italy, some captured German Luftwaffe or Italian Air Force (Regia Aeronautica) airfields were repaired and placed into service.