United States Air Force Air Commandos

Madonna Yancey

Description

"Any Time Any Place" is the motto of the United States Air Force Commandos. Feel as though you are a member of this elite group as you read the history of the Air Commandos as they proudly served from World War II to the present. This book contains the history of the group, numerous aircraft photos, and biographical profiles of the veterans who have served.

Sujets

• Histoire
• Fuerza Aérea de los Estados Unidos
• Military
• History
• United States Air Force
• Aviation

Informations

• Publié par: Turner Publishing Company
• Date de parution: 01 décembre 2000
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781618585554
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Turner Publishing Company Publishers of Military History P.O. Box 3101 Paducah, Kentucky 42002-3101
 
Co-published by Mark A. Thompson, Associate Publisher
 
For book publishing write to: M.T. Publishing Company, Inc. P.O. Box 6802 Evansville, Indiana 47719-6802
 
Pre-Press work by M.T. Publishing Company, Inc. Graphic Designer: Kyle J. Davis
 
Author: Madonna Yancey
 
Copyright © 2000 Turner Publishing Company
 
This book or any part thereof may not be reproduced without the written consent of the Publishers.
 
The materials were compiled and produced using available information; Turner Publishing Company, M.T. Publishing Company, Inc. regret they cannot assume liability for errors or omissions.
Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 00-134405
9781618585554
 
Printed in the United States of America
 
Limited Edition
Table of Contents
Title Page Copyright Page PUBLISHER’S NOTE history THE HISTORY OF THE AIR COMMANDOS AIRCRAFT BIOGRAPHY INDEX NOTES
Battle Damaged EC-47 Aircraft, NKP Thailand, May 1973, 56th Special Operations Wing. (Courtesy Alfred Gummerson)
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
It is with great pleasure that we introduce this volume on the Air Commando.
 
We owe our deepest gratitude to all the men who served as Air Commandos, for giving of themselves, heart and soul and in some cases their lives, during their courageous service to our country.
 
We extend our gratitude to Air Commando Association for their cooperation in producing this book. Special thanks to the Association Museum staff for their assistance in seeing this project through to its completion.
 
A special acknowledgment goes to Madonna Yancey for writing the manuscript for the front of this publication.
 
We are indebted to the individuals who submitted photographs and additional material from which information was compiled.
 
Turner Publishing Company leads the way in military association history book publishing, and we hope all will enjoy our newest title that chronicles the history of Air Commandos.
 
 
Dave Turner, President Mark A. Thompson, Associate Publisher
history

End of mission “Home Free Nakah Phanam.” Joe Kittinger, Pilot. (Courtesy Air Commando Association)
THE HISTORY OF THE AIR COMMANDOS

The Air Commandos have a long and glorious history, a history that traces back to World War II and to the mountains and jungles of the China-Burma-India Theater. The creation of the Commandos came from the extraordinary vision of General Henry H. “Hap” Arnold, the exemplary leadership of two U.S. Army Air Force Lt. Colonels - Philip Cochran and John Alison - and the skill and bravery of the men of the storied 1 st Air Commando Group.
In the early years of World War II, the Japanese set out to gain control of all of Southeast Asia. One by one, the countries of this region and strategic Pacific Islands were overrun by Japanese troops. In just a few short years, French Indochina, Thailand, Malaya, Hong Kong, Guam, the Philippines, Wake Island, the Dutch East Indies, and Burma were all under Japanese control, as was much of mainland China.
The battle for China had actually begun in 1931, when a group of Japanese army extremists took control of the Chinese province of Manchuria. Although the conquest was in defiance of official government policy, the Japanese were not about to let go of their prize conquest. By the summer of 1937, the Japanese were launching attacks on the remainder of the Chinese mainland. By 1941, they had nearly cut off China from the rest of the world.
While China was the biggest prize, Burma was the key to Japanese dominance of the region. The small number of resistance fighters remaining in China were being supplied by the British in India along a route known as the Burma Road, which extended to the city of Kunming. Cutting off those supply lines would effectively put an end to the Chinese resistance, freeing the enemy’s troops to engage in other operations. Control of Burma would also give the Japanese a staging area for moving into India, the next great prize they sought to win. And a Burma under Japanese control would help the Imperial Army block the Allies from advancing into their nearly conquered territories in Southeast Asia.
In addition to its strategic importance to the Japanese plan for domination of Asia, Burma had other enticements. Japan was a country poor in natural resources; Burma was a country rich in rubber, oil, tin, and other materials the Imperial Army desperately needed to prosecute the war. Burma also had another commodity the Japanese needed: the country could produce millions of tons of rice each year, food to fill the bellies of hungry enemy troops and enable them to keep fighting.
Just barely two weeks after their attack on Pearl Harbor had drawn the United States into the war, Japan began their invasion of Burma. While the Allies bravely attempted to defend Burma, they were ill equipped to do so and quickly learned that they were no match, at least at that time, for the Japanese army. As the Allied troops began their retreat back into India, the enemy, adept at jungle fighting, used the country’s inhospitable terrain to their advantage, constantly harassing the retreating troops with roadblocks and sneak attacks. By the spring of 1942, Burma was firmly in enemy hands, China was isolated, and the Japanese seemed in control of the war. The Allies, however, would soon create a new weapon to meet the enemy’s challenge.
The Allies were determined to keep General Chaing Kai-Shek’s forces in the war. With the Burma Road cut off and Burma in Japanese hands, they had to devise some way to keep his troops supplied from bases in northern India. One enormous obstacle lay in the path from the military bases in northern India to Chaing Kai-Shek’s troops in Kunming, China - the majestic, snow-capped peaks of the Himalayas, the highest mountain range on earth. The men who had flown across this mass of rocks and glaciers tagged it with a nickname: the “Hump.”
Some of the most spectacular scenery ever seen by man lay along this mountainous route. For all of their beauty, however, the Himalayas were also one of the most treacherous places on earth. The 650-mile route from India to China was fraught with danger along every mile. The mountains were often shrouded in dense fogs, and the area was subject to violent snowstorms, downpours of freezing rain, and winds so fierce they could toss an airplane around like it was a mere toy. Adding to the already hazardous missions, the route into China passed over Japanese-controlled Burma. One route across the Hump became known as the “aluminum trail” because it was littered with the wreckage of so many aircraft.
While U.S. Army Air Forces planes were ferrying supplies from India into China, Allied engineers were trying to construct a land route from India into China through northern Burma. And in the meantime, the troops that had retreated from Burma back into India under the command of Joseph Stillwell, an American general, were reorganizing for the next effort to wrest Burma from Japanese control.

GENERAL WINGATE AND THE CHINDITS
Into this situation came a British brigadier general named Orde C. Wingate. General Wingate was something of a maverick, considered by many to be a brilliant and charismatic, if somewhat unconventional, leader. With his arrival, the course of the war in that part of the world would undergo a dramatic change, a change that would give birth to the Air Commandos.
General Wingate knew that conventional tactics of waging war would never work against the Japanese troops who were firmly entrenched in the jungles and mountains of Burma. Instead, he proposed using long-range penetration columns (LRPs) that would use guerilla tactics against the Japanese. They would make forays behind enemy lines, hitting critical transportation and communications links, including railway lines, bridges, and boats. If these tactics worked, they would be able to stop the flow of supplies into the interior of the country from the port of Rangoon and the major city of Mandalay. General Wingate had successfully employed these tactics against Axis troops in Libya and against the Arabs in Palestine.
General Wingate’s troops were known as the “Chindits,” named for the mythical winged stone lions that guarded Buddhist temples. Officially, they were the 77th Infantry Brigade, comprising the 13th Battalion of the King’s Liverpool Regiment, the 3rd Battalion of the elite Gurkha Rifles company, the 142nd Commando Company, and the 2nd Battalion of the Burma Rifles company. Together they formed a seven-column brigade of nearly 3000 men. To carry their supplies into enemy-held territory, they had hundreds of mules, oxen, and elephants.
Early February of 1943 marked the beginning of Operation Longcloth. On February 8, 1943, General Wingate’s Chindits, and their supply animals, crossed from India into Burma. The Chindits’ first incursion into Burma had several objectives. They were to penetrate deep into the country and reach their first target undetected by the enemy. To support this first objective, the 23rd Indian Division mounted an attack against the Japanese to keep them occupied and unaware of the movements of the Chindits. Once in Burma, they were to cut the main railway line which ran between Mandalay and Myitkyina. If possible, they were also to cross the Irrawaddy River and make a second cut in the rail line, this time between Mandalay and Lashio. And they planned to harass enemy troops with surprise attacks in the Shwebo area.
The Chindits were accompanied by an officer from the British RAF, who was to prepare them for being resupplied by air drops 16 days later. The resupply plan did not work as it had been envisioned. The Chindits moved at night, making them difficult to locate and the resupply missions ineffective.
The Chindits suffered heavy casualties when two of the columns were ambushed at the railway line. The