A mighty gathering, 23 years ago today
Admittedly, you would be hard-pressed to find a cooler collection of aircraft in one place at one time.
Category Archives: USAF
Sherman was right, 1945 revisit
Here we see a P-47N Thunderbolt of the 7th AAF’s 19th Fighter Squadron, 318th Fighter Group, at Ie Shima Airfield on Ryukyu Retto, Okinawa on 7 July 1945, with an M2 machine-gun-armed M3 half-track on anti-paratrooper/banzai defense.
Photo 65093AC
Notably, the “Jug” (S/N 44-88104) is named “Sherman Was Right” (which was apparently a popular name for AAF fighters in both theaters of the war).
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The reference is likely an ode to the Union General’s 1879 ” war is Hell!” speech to the graduating class of the Michigan Military Academy.
Of course, you could also argue that sections of Sherman’s well known, “War is a Terrible Thing” rant from the eve of the Civil War referencing the South’s slim likelihood of victory in the coming fracas between the states as a direct allegory to Japan’s own chances of winning the Pacific War.
That quote, below:
“You people of the South don’t know what you are doing. This country will be drenched in blood, and God only knows how it will end. It is all folly, madness, a crime against civilization!
You people speak so lightly of war; you don’t know what you’re talking about. War is a terrible thing! You mistake, too, the people of the North. They are a peaceable people but an earnest people, and they will fight, too. They are not going to let this country be destroyed without a mighty effort to save it.
Besides, where are your men and appliances of war to contend against them? The North can make a steam engine, locomotive, or railway car; hardly a yard of cloth or pair of shoes can you make. You are rushing into war with one of the most powerful, ingeniously mechanical, and determined people on Earth — right at your doors. You are bound to fail.
Only in your spirit and determination are you prepared for war. In all else you are totally unprepared, with a bad cause to start with. At first you will make headway, but as your limited resources begin to fail, shut out from the markets of Europe as you will be, your cause will begin to wane. If your people will but stop and think, they must see in the end that you will surely fail.”
~William Tecumseh Sherman, December 24, 1860.”
Packing a Wallops, 75 Years Ago Today
The first research sounding rocket launched from Wallops Island, on the Eastern Shore of Virginia, was an experimental 17-foot Tiamat JB-3 “Jet-Bomb” on July 4, 1945. A Scout launch vehicle, it took off from an angled rack from the beach and used a 7-chamber custom booster developed by Hughes to get it off the ground. Tiamat went on to equip a few modified A-26 Invaders in 1946, sans booster, as an early air-to-air missile.
Since then, Wallops has been steady in the rocket-launching biz. Today, NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility is NASA’s only owned and operated launch range.
Since 1945, NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility has launched more than 15,000 rockets from Wallops Island for science studies, technology development, and as targets for the U.S. military.
Wallops roots are based on this country’s need for missile research during World War II. The Langley Aeronautical Laboratory in Hampton, Va. was tasked with supporting this research. A place was needed on the water, near Langley and near a military facility. Wallops Island fit the bill. The first test rocket was launched on June 27, 1945. The first research rocket, a Tiamat, was launched several days later on July 4.
Today, Wallops still launches Antares rockets with Cygnus resupply pods to the International Space Station, among other bottle rockets.
Coming home from the Forgotten War
As appropriate with the 70th anniversary of the Korean War this month, the DOD reports:
In the largest repatriation of South Korean soldiers’ remains from the Korean War, 147 such remains were returned to South Korea following an honor ceremony last week at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii.
Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency and [South Korea’s] Ministry of National Defense Agency for KIA Recovery and Identification have jointly worked on the remains, as being ROK soldiers who had often died alongside U.S. troops.
MAKRI and DPAA scientists have conducted joint forensic reviews and validated 147 remains as being of South Korean origin.
In a mutual exchange, six Americans identified on South Korean battlefields were transferred to U.S. custody at Osan.
Honor Guard from UN countries participates in a dignified transfer as part of a repatriation ceremony at Osan Air Base, Republic of Korea, June 26, 2020. The United Nations Command in Korea remains committed to enforcing the 1953 UN Armistice Agreement and overseeing activities such as this repatriation. (U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Noah Sudolcan)
Coming in hot
Low-level pass of a captured Messerschmitt Me 262 flown by an American pilot in front of General Carl “Tooey” Spaatz, commander of Strategic Air Forces in Europe, 27 June 1945, 75 years ago today.
Nicknamed Schwalbe (Swallow), the German jet fighter was first introduced to combat in June 1944, almost a year before VE-Day. Although almost 1,500 were produced and Luffwaffle fighter jocks claimed 500~ air-to-air victories while flying them, mostly against Allied bombers, it was just too little too late and about a third were lost on the ground or to RAF Spitfires and USAAF P-51s, who were still superior to the Schwalbe in dogfights.
Only about a dozen exist around the world today, typically captured aircraft that, like the one above, were tested by the Allies seeking lessons in the next generation of fighters such as the F-86.
Fairchild Camera Machine Gun trainer, 80 years ago today
Via the California Military Department Historical Collection:
Soldiers of the California National Guard’s Los Angeles-based 115th Observation Squadron (now the Channel Islands Air National Guard Station-based 115th Airlift Squadron) manning a Fairchild Camera Machine Gun trainer at Fort Lewis, Washington during the 1940 Fourth Army Maneuvers as part of California’s 40th Division. 9 June 1940.
Note the potato sack sandbags with a Van Nuys address, and the soldiers’ M1917 tin pan helmets. Also, ties!
Rather than use more expensive live or blank ammunition, Fairchild Aerial Camera Corporation developed this system for aircrews to train with. The system used film to evaluate the gunner’s performance.
Normally mounted on aircraft, it is seen here mounted on a tripod used for ground or low-level antiaircraft defense training.
Flight tests show B61-12 compatible with F-15E Strike Eagle
Via Sandia National Laboratories:
“Dropped from above 25,000 feet, the mock B61-12 nuclear gravity bomb was in the air for approximately 55 seconds before hitting and embedding in the lakebed, splashing a 40- to 50-foot puff of desert dust from the designated impact area at Sandia National Laboratories’ Tonopah Test Range in Nevada.”
The platform for the tactical nuke? The common F-15E.
My Girl, 75 years ago today
A North American P-51 Mustang of the USAAF, nicknamed “My Girl,” takes off from Iwo Jima in the Bonin Islands, 1 June 1945.
LC-USZ62-93535
As noted by the WW2 Database, My Girl is a P-51D-20NA of 457th Fighter Squadron in the 20th Air Force’s 506th Fighter Group, which was stationed at Iwo’s North Field at the time, specializing in conducting 1,500-mile round trips escorting B-29s over Japan. That would explain the two large drop tanks.
Of note:
One of the greatest limiting factors of fighter escorts from Iwo was the human factor. The B-29 was heated and pressurized. Compared to the unheated, unpressurized P-51, the bomber crews sat in secure comfort. The punishment on the fighter pilots’ bodies was compounded by the extremely high altitudes they flew to escort the bombers, usually more than 30,000 feet. This was several thousand feet higher than fighter pilots flew in Europe, escorting B-17 and B-24 bombers. The round trip from Iwo to Japan and back was nine hours, spent in a physically battered state.
Remember, today is not about saving (up to) 40 percent on select items
It’s a small plot of land that’s never left unguarded. The Sentinels who guard the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier are a small and exclusive group. They stand their post 24 hours a day, 365 days a year regardless of the weather. Hear the Sentinel’s Creed and you’ll know why. DOD video edited by Air Force Staff Sgt. Jared Bunn
Biloxi Blues
Back during WWII, the sight and sound of piston-engined aircraft and newly-minted Army Air Force airmen learning their paces became a fixture that has remained for over 75 years.
Keesler Field, founded in June 1941, was named after a Great War aerial observer from Mississippi who was killed over Verdun in 1918. It became both a basic training facility as well as an advanced school for gunners.
After the war, Keesler became an Air Force base and remained an advanced school for navaids and meteorology. A Biloxi institution, the base today is the home of the Air Force Reserve’s Hurricane Hunters and everyone knows people who work there. Hell, I turned down a DAF police job there once upon a time.
Fast forward to 2020, and the fresh recruits have returned.
For the first time since 1968, a flight of nearly 60 Airmen graduated USAF Basic Military Training outside of Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, Texas. Airmen from the 37th Training Wing Detachment 5 marched across the Levitow Training Support Facility drill pad at Keesler Air Force Base, May 15.
Due to safety concerns stemming from #COVID19, the Air Force sent new recruits to Keesler AFB to demonstrate a proof of concept to generate the force at multiple locations during contingencies.
“These changes are part of our operational mindset to fight through COVID-19 and mitigate force health risks.” -Maj. Gen. Andrea Tullos, Second Air Force commander
All graduating Airmen from this flight will continue their technical training at Keesler AFB.
Military training instructors lead graduating Airmen onto the drill pad during a graduation ceremony at Keesler Air Force Base, Miss., May 15, 2020. Nearly 60 Airmen from the 37th Training Wing Detachment 5 completed the six-week basic military training course. Due to safety concerns stemming from COVID-19, the Air Force sent new recruits to Keesler AFB to demonstrate a proof of concept to generate the force at multiple locations during contingencies. The flight was the first to graduate BMT at Keesler since 1968. (U.S. Air Force photo by Kemberly Groue)