Category Archives: US Army

Why the ‘Bulge’

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A graphic view of why the desperate German Ardennes offensive (Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein) is known more popularly, at least in the U.S., as the “Battle of the Bulge.” The map shows the limit of the German offensive, Dec. 1944, illustrating at least 28 identified German Wehrmacht (Heer) and Waffen-SS divisions as well as two separate brigade groups trying to wedge the line between the U.S. Ninth and First Army, and the British 30 Corps and U.S. Third Army.

Via War Department. The Adjutant General’s Office. 3/4/1907-9/18/1947, National Archives Identifier: 100384371

Full-size 7360×5830 map, here.

Red Arrow at War

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80 Years Ago: Papua, New Guinea, December 1942:

“Red Arrow at War by Michael Gnatek” via the U.S. Army National Guard Heritage Painting Program.

The 32nd Infantry Division, known as the “Red Arrow” Division. made up of units from the Michigan and Wisconsin National Guards (126th Infantry Regiment, 127th Infantry Regiment, and the 128th Infantry Regiment), was mobilized on 15 October 1940.

Slated to depart for Northern Ireland after World War II began, the division was diverted to the Pacific at the last minute, arriving in Australia in May 1942. Elements moved to Port Moresby, New Guinea in September 1942, in order to halt the Japanese invasion which threatened Australia. The Red Arrow’s 126th Infantry Regiment went by ship; the 128th Infantry was airlifted in the first mass troop movement by air in World War II. Joining the Australians, the 32d entered combat on 16 November 1942.

Soldiers from the 32nd “Red Arrow” Division’s 2nd Battalion, 127th Infantry Regiment adjust their clothing and equipment after disembarking a transport plane that brought them from Port Moresby to the Dubadura air strip eight miles south of Buna, Papua New Guinea Dec. 15, 1942. Note the boonie hats–M1941 Herring Bone Twill (HBT) sun hats– M1905 bayonets, and serious love of multiple Thompson pouches per user. U.S. Army Signal Corps photo

32nd “Red Arrow” Division Soldiers position themselves behind a captured Japanese breastwork near Cape Endaiadere, New Guinea, Dec. 21, 1942. Note the M1928 and boonie hats. U.S. Army Signal Corps photo

The Allied forces were to take heavily-fortified Japanese positions at Buna, on New Guinea’s southeast coast. It proved to be one of the most difficult campaigns of the war. Fighting in the hot, steamy jungles, the 32d was desperately short of basic equipment, weapons, medicine, and even food. In the terrible heat and drenching rain the men of the 32d, many of them burning with fever, had to reduce Japanese positions one at a time, usually by rushing them with grenades. Most of the Japanese fought to the death, but finally, on 2 January 1943, Buna fell.

It was the Japanese Army’s first defeat in modern history, but for the 32d Division the cost was high: 1,954 were either killed or wounded, with 2,952 hospitalized due to disease.

After Buna, the 32d participated in the long campaign to drive the Japanese from the rest of New Guinea and went on to see heavy fighting in the Philippines.

Across 654 Days of Combat– twice the average amount seen by most divisions in the European Theatre of Operations– the 32nd would suffer 7,268 casualties.

Today, the 32d Infantry Brigade, Wisconsin Army National Guard, continues to maintain the Red Arrow heritage.

The WARNG maintains an excellent photo depository of the Red Arrow in WWII.

Many Hands Make Light Work

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An important milestone occurred this weekend across 45 minutes on a humid and foggy Saturday morning for the Biloxi National Cemetery. The unit, which honors well over 17,000 of the nation’s veterans (going back to the war with Mexico) and their spouses, celebrated its 10th annual Christmas wreath drive.

Sadly, the number of wreaths grows each season. Total number of wreaths this year pushed the 25,000 mark

In an effort that costs the government or the VA nothing, a core of volunteers– heavy with youth groups such as Scouts and JROTC– covered the grounds with donated wreaths, making sure every gravesite had one.

Of course, the background work included local businesses donating funds for wreaths and new bows (replaced yearly) and further smaller teams of volunteers who worked all day Thursday unloading and Friday staging the wreaths/affixing new bows, but the work went cheerfully.

I am glad to have participated in this mission for the past several years with my family. 

I try to say a little piece and acknowledge the individual Veteran on each of the wreaths I install, in addition to taking it upon myself to cover the graves of those I knew personally.

A pole/broomstick/piece of PVC pipe (and a buddy to carry the other end) helps greatly.

Of course, the crowds of volunteers will be smaller on Jan. 7th when we go to pick them back up but, that’s part of the job!

If you have a national cemetery in your area that doesn’t do something similar, please think about starting such an effort.

If they already do, please join in the effort. Every pair of hands helps!

Battery X at 80

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Via the Army’s Center for Military History and the U.S. Army Women’s Museum:

On 5 May 1942, shortly after the United States entered World War II, the War Department formed the Military District of Washington (MDW) to plan and execute the ground and anti-aircraft defense of the nation’s capital. As the Army transformed its wartime stateside logistical structure from nine corps areas to the Army Service Forces (ASF) and its subordinate Support Commands, MDW became one of those commands. In its new role, MDW assumed responsibility for supporting the Army Headquarters commandant and the newly-completed Pentagon, in addition to Walter Reed Army Hospital, as well as ceremonial activities in Washington with the U.S. Army Band as a subordinate unit.

General George C. Marshall, began thinking about allowing women to serve in a limited combat role, in assignments to the anti-aircraft units of the Coast Artillery Corps (CAC) in the Continental United States.

In early December 1942, “Battery X” was formed. About 70 Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAACS) members were selected to perform duty in anti-aircraft dugout emplacements. They received six weeks of training as range-finder operators, and in manning (no pun intended) anti-aircraft defenses. These WAACs were the first women in U.S. history to be part of a combat unit and were authorized to wear the branch insignia of the Coast Artillery.

“Battery X” personeel training on a 40mm/60 Bofors

Battery X at Bethany Beach Delaware working with a 90mm M1 AAA battery, 1943

They were expected to train other women to eventually replace male range-finder instrument operators at harbor defense installations in the Continental United States and mixed into the ranks of the 71st and 89th Coastal Artillery Regiments.

Despite the potential it may have unleashed, the experiment proved short-lived, disbanded in August 1943. It remains relatively unknown, not even declassified until the 1970s.

In more detail:

In the experiment, General George C. Marshall and Colonel Oveta Hobby hand-picked eleven WAC officers and fifty-eight enlisted women to compose the WAC component of Battery X, and the two complimented units worked around the clock in three 8-hour shifts to operate the M1A1 90mm heavy antiaircraft gun batteries and their supporting radar stations. The experiment ran from February to August 1943, when the experiment concluded with a radar tracking and gun-laying test on Bethany Beach, Delaware. In the concluding test, the WACs used radar to aim the connected 90mm gun at a moving target attached to a B-17 heavy bomber. This test was deemed to be successful by General Marshall and Colonel Hobby, though the units were quickly disbanded for other roles in other theaters. The WACs served until the end of the war, where most enlisted women were discharged from service and resumed their civilian lives. Others continued serving in the WACs, creating the core of the peacetime WAC organization.

Chilly Turkey Day, 80 Years Ago

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Official caption: “Thanksgiving Day Exercises For Men Of 2nd Service Group in Air Force Engineering Shop At An Airfield Somewhere In Iceland. 26 November 1942.”

(U.S. Air Force Number 75406AC) Via NARA 

Note the mix of leather flight jackets, utilities, overalls, and field dress, with Brodie helmets and gas masks on the wall at the ready. Also, note the proximity of the wood stove– essential on the wind-swept outpost in winter.

Snow Scene At 2nd Service Group Airfield, Reykjavik, Iceland. Note The Douglas A-20 ‘Miss Carolina’ To The Left. 30 November 1942. (U.S. Air Force Number 75412AC) via NARA 

When the U.S. arrived in Iceland in the summer of 1941— months prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor and while still ostensibly neutral– to take over the occupation of the Danish colony from the British, the USAAF soon flew in elements of the 33d Pursuit Squadron (P-40s), 9th Bomber Squadron (H)(A-20s), and 1st Observation Squadron to relieve the RAF’s own force (one squadron of 15 Wellington bombers, a flight of Hurricane fighters, a Norwegian squadron of 6 Northrop reconnaissance float planes, and 30 utility planes) for use elsewhere. It was the 2nd SG that supported these operations, part of a force that would grow to almost 30,000 Allied troops by 1943.

Notably, the USAAF achieved its first Army Air Forces aerial victory in the European theater on 14 August 1942 when Iceland-based fighters shot down a Luftwaffe FW- 200 C-4 Condor.

Meanwhile, the Navy’s VP-73 (PBY Catalinas) and VP-74 (PBM Mariners) would set up operations at Keflavik in August 1941 (and stay there for a while!)

Echohawk

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The 45th Infantry (“Thunderbird”) Division Museum in Oklahoma recently shared a gripping series of combat drawings by Brummett Echohawk.

An unofficial war artist, Echohawk was a Pawnee, Kit-Kahaki (warrior band) and “saw the elephant” firsthand as an infantryman with the 45th’s 179th Infantry Regiment, earning the Combat Infantry Badge, Bronze Star, and Purple Heart (3), after enlisting in the Oklahoma National Guard in 1940 at age 18.

His outfit was filled with depression-era cowboys, farmers, and more than a thousand Native Americans– recently brought back into the attention of many due to the recent Liberator series on Netflix– with Echohawk and William Lasley, a Potawatomie, leading a successful charge at Anzio Beach to take the “Factory” which insured that the Allied toe-hold at Anzio Beach was secure.

A number of his drawings made it into wartime publications.

The Thunderbirds suffered 26,449 casualties in 230 days of combat across Europe, some 187.7 percent of its authorized strength.

As for Echohawk, he went on to become a well-recognized artist specializing in Western and Native themes and is well-exhibited at the Gilcrease Museum and the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Center.

Trail of Tears, by Brummett Echohawk, black, and whitewash, 1957 via the Gilcrest

SGT Echohawk passed at age 83 in 2006 and is buried in Pawnee’s Highland Cemetery.

For more information, visit the Echohawk Project and pick up his books, including Drawing Fire: A Pawnee, Artist, and Thunderbird in World War II.

SIG Rattler, now in 7.62x39mm for SOCOM?

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SOCOM– which earlier this year for up to $5 million worth of “Reduced Signature” PDW weapons in the form of modified commercial SIG MCX Rattlers in both 5.56 NATO and .300 Blackout– posted the notice for 7.62x39mm uppers for the platform in late October.

“Due to developing requirements,” explains the notice, the force at the tip of the spear is seeking conversion kits to include all “required hardware and ammunition magazines that will fit with the SIG Sauer Rattler and RSAR/PDW converted M4A1 lower receiver groups.”

SOCOM may be in luck as SIG recently debuted their first 7.62×39-chambered offerings in the MCX Spear-LT series. One of the options in that series is a factory SBR with an 11-inch barrel and an overall length of 29.75 inches, something that puts the company within striking distance of the RFI notice.

More in my column at Guns.com.

On the road again…

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Last week I was on the road filming in Alabama, Florida, and Georgia with three of my Guns.com homies. While this involved such pedestrian adventures as living out of rental van/suitcase/hotels, eating unhealthy food, drinking black coffee, and dodging Hurricane Nicole (the first November H-cane U.S. landfall in 37 years!), I also got to visit old friends such as Big Gray AL:

Which is currently undergoing an extensive deck replacement program.

And stop in to get some behind-the-scenes “off-tour” stuff in at the Army Aviation Museum onboard Mother Rucker.

Was stoked to see all these guys in the same place at once– video coming soon! FWIW, good eyes if you spotted the world’s only Bell 207 Sioux Scout, the prototype Bell Model 209 Cobra — with retractable skids– next to a rare former Spanish Navy G-model Cobra, an early AH-64 Apache, one of only two Boeing–Sikorsky RAH-66 Comanches that exist, and one of only four surviving Lockheed AH-56 Cheyennes.

Anywhoo, I’m back now, baby, with no plans for (work) travel for the rest of the year, so buckle up.

The observance is about so much more than Veterans Day sales.

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Veterans Day originated as “Armistice Day” on Nov. 11, 1919, the first anniversary of the end of World War I. Congress passed a resolution in 1926 making it an annual observance, and it became a national holiday in 1938.

Sixteen years later, then-President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed legislation changing the name to Veterans Day to honor all those who served their country during war or peacetime.

On this day, the nation honors military veterans — living and dead — with parades and other observances across the country and, in particular, a ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.

According to the Census Bureau and VA, there are some 16.5 million living military veterans in the United States in 2021. Of those, some 25 percent of the total are aged 75 and older while just 8.2 percent of veterans were younger than 35. Telling statistics.

A Bit of War History, The Veteran, by Thomas Waterman Wood (American, Montpelier, Vermont 1823–1903 New York), circa 1866

Freedom isn’t free, folks.

Also, be there for your fellow humans.

Veteran suicide is on the decline, but it continues to claim lives.

According to the 2022 NATIONAL VETERAN SUICIDE PREVENTION ANNUAL REPORT:

  • In 2020, there were 6,146 Veteran suicide deaths, which was 343 fewer than in 2019. The unadjusted rate of suicide in 2020 among U.S. Veterans was 31.7 per 100,000.
  • Over the period from 2001 through 2020, age- and sex-adjusted suicide rates for Veterans peaked in 2018 and then fell in 2019 and 2020. From 2018 to 2020, age- and sex-adjusted suicide rates for Veterans fell by 9.7%.
  • Among non-Veteran U.S. adults, age- and sex-adjusted suicide rates also peaked in 2018 and fell in 2019 and 2020. From 2018 to 2020, age- and sex-adjusted suicide rates for non-Veteran adults fell by 5.5%.
  • In each year from 2001 through 2020, age- and sex-adjusted suicide rates of Veterans exceeded those of non- Veteran U.S. adults. The differential in adjusted rates was smallest in 2002, when the Veteran rate was 12.1% higher than for non-Veterans and largest in 2017, when the Veteran rate was 66.2% higher. In 2020, the rate for Veterans was 57.3% higher than that of non-Veteran adults.
  • From 2019 to 2020, the age- and sex-adjusted suicide rate for Veterans fell by 4.8%, while for non-Veteran U.S. adults, the adjusted rate fell by 3.6%.
  • From 2019 to 2020, among Veteran men, the age-adjusted suicide rate fell by 0.7%, and among Veteran women, the age-adjusted suicide rate fell by 14.1%. By comparison, among non-Veteran U.S. men, the age-adjusted rate fell by 2.1%, and among non-Veteran women, the age-adjusted rate fell by 8.4%.
  • In each year from 2001 through 2020, age- and sex-adjusted suicide rates of Recent Veteran VHA Users exceeded those of Other Veterans. The differential in adjusted rates was smallest in 2018, when the rate for Recent Veteran VHA Users was 9.4% higher and largest in 2002, when the rate was 80.9% higher. In 2020, the age and sex-adjusted suicide rate of Recent Veteran VHA Users was 43.4% higher than for Other Veterans.
  • In 2020, suicide was the 13th leading cause of death among Veterans overall, and it was the second leading cause of death among Veterans under age 45.
  • The COVID-19 pandemic was announced in early March 2020. By the year’s end, COVID-19 was the 3rd leading cause of death in the United States, both overall10 and for Veterans. Despite the pandemic, the Veteran suicide rate in 2020 continued a decline that began in 2019.
  • Comparisons of trends in Veteran suicide and COVID-19 mortality over the course of 2020, and across Veteran demographic and clinical subgroups, did not indicate an impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Veteran suicide mortality.

If you or someone you know needs help –

Link: https://www.mentalhealth.va.gov/suicide_prevention/index.asp

 

Lindbergh’s Own, 1944 Edition

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Here we see a group of Army Aviators clustered around “White 29,” Bell P-39Q-5-BE Airacobra/42-20349, of the “Musketeers” of the 110th Reconnaissance Squadron (Fighter), taken at Tadji Airfield, New Guinea in a photo dated 28 October 1944 (although likely taken as much as four months prior). LT Hunt is listed as the assigned pilot.

Photo via the UTA Libraries Digital Collection https://library.uta.edu/digitalgallery/img/20038768

“Texas fighter pilots are pictured here. Left to right, they are, First Lieutenants Daron M. Reedy, Henry E. Parish, Wilkins W. Hunt, Junior (Jr.), Michael L. Evans, L. H. Williams, and Van Kennon. Six men wearing uniforms are posing by a fighter plane. On the door of the plane is a skeleton wearing armor and holding a sword with dripping blood. The number 29 is on the nose of the plane and in a small box it says Pilot LT. HUNT Crew Chief S/SGT GLYNN. The tail of the plane has the number 349 on it.”

For reference, the 110th Rec. Sq. (F) was originally organized as the 110th Aero Squadron back in 1917, flying Jennys.

Beginning WWII equipped with Douglas O-38 biplanes and the lumbering North American O-47, they were rushed to California after Pearl Harbor to conduct anti-submarine coastal patrols.

Upgrading to a mix of P-39Q and P-40N armed photo birds in 1942, the squadron embarked for Australia and then New Guinea where they became operational in December flying, in turn, from 5 Mile Drome at Port Moresby, Gusap Airfield, and Tadji before moving onto Biak, the Philippines, and the Ryukyus by the end f the war. By that time they were using super sexy F-6D Mustang photo birds. 

Don’t let the recon aspect of their service fool you, by the end of the war the unit counted across 437 days in combat some 21 air-to-air victories, 102 aircraft destroyed on the ground, 2.8 million pounds of bombs dropped in addition to 14,000 gallons of napalm, and over 3.2 million rounds of ammo expended– including 41,835 37mm cannon shells from the nose of their Airacobras.

The 110th’s end-of-the-war scorecard Ie Shima, in the fall of 1945.

Redesignated a bomber outfit after WWII, today the unit is the 110th Bomb Squadron, flying the B-2 Spirit out of Whiteman AFB, Missouri, and is known as “Lindbergh’s Own” due to the fact that a young Charles A. Lindbergh was a junior officer in the unit from 1924 to 1929, including the period when he made his famous trans-Atlantic flight.

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