The prisoners of Rabaul (Was: P-39's, zeros, etc.)

From: Cub Driver lo

ed flying to Australia in one of them. I can
look this up in Bloody Shambles if you like.

I just bought this two-volume set (and damned pricey at 29.95 pounds per
volume) with high hopes. Haven't begun on it yet, but noting your comment
above I turned to the description of the MacArthur evacuation and noted, alas,
errors of no small moment. The authors state that of the 4 B-17s originally
sent for MacA., two turned back with engine trouble, true enough, but then say
that a third crashed off the Australian coast. Very wrong. This was Capt.
Godwin's B-17, which he put down into the sea short of the runway at Del Monte
Field, close enough that the crew could wade ashore and Godwin could receive
some choice words from them complimenting him on his flying skill. It was also
at Del Monte where Godwin met MacArthur and charmed him into making him his
personal pilot for the flight down and then put him on his staff. This is all
pretty well known stuff and for the "Bloody Shambles" trio of author's to not
know this, especially considering how it affected future air operations, is
distressing. Further on the authors' state that 3 "new" B-17s were sent to
fetch McA. At first reading I took this literally and snorted, as there were
no "new" B-17s in the theater at the time, and with the lack of spare parts--or
even any facilities where engine changes could be performed--any "new" B-17s
sent to Australia very quickly would have been well used. But on reflection it
could be interpreted that the authors by writing "new" meant to say
"additional" or "other," so I'll let that go.
But having spotted this blunder among others on first cracking open the cover,
I wonder what other gross errors litter the text. And this is supposed to be
one of the better researched books on WW2 aviation.
Crap.


Chris Mark

Where I mention Godwin I meant Godman. And re those three "new" B-17s sent,
one of these aborted within minutes of leaving Batchelor Field and never left
Australia, let alone made it to Del Monte Field, so only two got in. Bloody
Shambles says this plane developed engine trouble at Del Monte field. If so,
it never would have left it. Because there was not way to repair it and no way
a B-17 could get out of that field on three engines. Apparently the authors of
BS (good acronym for this book) believe fixing a B-17 engine is a trivial
matter, easily accomplished without tools or spare parts, or those totally
unnecessary drones, airplane mechanics.


Chris Mark

From: (Peter Stickney)

Repair of a damaged engine at Del
Monte wasn't entirely out of the question. It had been used as a
fighter base since just before hostilities broke out. If the
repairs didn't require R1820 specific parts, they might just have
been supplies and people available to perform them.

There were three "main" strips at the Del Monte Plantation, designated by
number. No.1 was the only one suitable for B-17s to get in and out of. B-18s
also operated out of there and one was destroyed on the ground by strafing
Zeros a couple of weeks after the opening of hostilities. The carcass was still
there months later, having been looted of any useable components. 19th bomb
group mechanics evacuated from Luzon ended up at No.3, about 8 miles, about
half an hour by truck, from No. 1 with no transportion available and no
orders. No. 3 was a narrow grass strip edging a canyon 500 ft deep on one side
and a boulder field on the other. (No. 2 was a fighter strip.) They were left
stranded there for some time; in fact they were still up there in early April
when 3 B-17s and 10 B-25s flew up from Australia and landed at No. 1 strip to
give the Japs a little of their own back (these B-25s were technically owned by
the Dutch but the 3AG had "borrowed" them). Maj. Gen. Ralph Royce was flying
the lead B-17 and when he found out there were 19th group B-17 mechanics left
in the lurch at No.3 he issued orders in no uncertain terms to get them down to
No.1. And he ordered the B-25s to fly over to No.3 so the Japs wouldn't be
able to nail all the bombers in one pass over the No. 1 strip, which they were
hitting daily. It was a tough squeeze to get the B-25s into that little strip.
Col. John Davies, who had been with the 27th Bomb Group in the PI when the Japs
attacked on Dec 8 and then evacuated to Australia when that group was sent down
to Java and then to Australia, where it merged with the 3d, led the B-25s.
Fortunately he had been to Del Monte before and knew the strip.
The next morning the B-25s took off to hit a Jap airfield at Cebu and on the
way were bounced by a couple of P-40s who apparently thought they were Nells,
but veered off, without firing and disappeared. When they blasted the jap
airfield there were Jap fighters in the air, but they didn't go after the B-25s
until after bombs away. Maybe they thought they were friendlies. But then
they came after them pretty hard. the firepower the B-25s put out seemed to
surprise them and after one close in pass they didn't push in too close. So
they didn't even put one hole in the 25s.
The B-17s were tasked with hitting targets at Luzon but one had engine trouble
and wasn't able to get off. The mechanics brought down from No.3 were
definitely needed (but no spare parts). They worked on it all morning and
were still at it when the other 2 B-17s returned and they left off to refuel
and rearm them for another strike. At this point the Jap air force showed up
and bombed the hell out of the field, destroying the B-17 under repair and
damaging the other two, so no second strike for them. The Japs missed the
B-25s at No.3, they being pretty well camoflaged by the ground crews who had
pushed them in amongst the boulders and trees. They refueld and rearmed and
went to Davao. On the afternoon mission the B-25s were escorted part way by a
P-40B and a P-40E. The P-40B could not keep up with the climb rate of the
B-25s--the E could--and it fell behind. The flight was intercepted by Petes
who dove on the climbing bombers and then circled around for a follow-up attack
which was broken up by the lone P-40E and the tangled mess of them spun down on
the P-40B which apparently knocked one of the Petes out of the sky. Anyway one
went down in flames. The B-25s flattend their climb and left the Japs and
P-40s behind.
There had been two P-40Es being worked on at No.3 when the B-25s left on their
second bombing raid, but while they were gone the Japs raided the field and one
of them failed to get airborne when they scrambled and crashed at the end of
the runway. The pilot was trapped in the flaming wreckage and because Gen.
Royce had ordered firefighting equipment (such as it was) to be brought down to
No. 1 to be ready to save the B-17s (and it turned out to be needed with the
bombing raid), the fire couldn't be put out and he burned to death. The body
was still smoldering in the wreckage when the B-25s got back. It was too hot
for anyone to get close. The body could be smelled cooking all that evening.
The ground crews worked all night to repair the bomb damaged B-17s. They got
them flyable, but without hydraulics, no brakes or superchargers (same problem
Pease had with his plane the month before when he flew up to get MacA). They
left the next morning with VIP evacuees, including Cmdr Bulkeley, the PT boat
skipper who had got MacA down from Luzon. A P-40 pilot stowed away. The two
B-17s were escorted along their way by one lone P-35. Two Petes intercepted
the huffing and puffing B-17s as they groaned out of the field so that P-35 was
needed. The pilot chased those Petes all over Del Monte plantation.
Gen. Royce decided the state of repair of the B-17s didn't suit him, so he
hitched a ride back on one of the B-25s, that were purring like contented cats,
since the 3AG had had enough sense to bring along some of their own
groundcrewmen to see that they stayed in good shape.
The B-25s flew two more missions the next day, returning from their second
mission at dusk. Their long-range tanks were refitted and they took off for
Australia at midnight. They took some fighter pilots along as excess baggage.
Everybody was dead beat, it being a damned long flight up from Charters Towers
to Del Monte and then immediately two combat missions back to back followed by
two more then next day and then fly right back to Australia. Those crews were
absolutely--ab-so-lute-ly--dead beat. But all 10 planes made it back without
mishap. One of those amazing unsung performances where everyone was stretched
to the limit and beyond, did their jobs to spec, overcoming very high risks and
unexpected obstacles of all sorts, yet completed the mission as good as it
could possibly be done, got no particular thanks (hey, it was what they were
paid to do), gave no particular thought to having done the job, and just went
on to the next near-impossible challenge.
The 19BG ground crews were left abandoned at Del Monte No. 1 AFAIK. But, hey,
they were enlisted men, so who cares, right? Except that their skills were in
very short supply during the next few months. If they could have been gotten
out maybe Harl Pease and his crew, among others, wouldn't have ended up
enduring Jap hospitality on Rabaul.


Chris Mark

when 3 B-17s and 10 B-25s flew up from Australia

As a footnote, two pilots of these 13 aircraft were awarded the medal of honor
in subsequent actions, both for raids to Rabaul, both posthumously One was
Capt. Pease. The other was Maj. Ray Wilkins.


Chris Mark

Apparently the description in Bloody Shambles of MacArthur's extraction from
Del Monte, as well as the description of the B-17/B-25 episode is lifted from
John Toland's But Not in Shame.
I've been told that the BS author's real interest was BCE stuff and they didn't
really give much attention to the US side.
At least they're not as bad as Costello (The Pacific War) in which he mentions
MacA's B-17 flight from Mindanao to Darwin took five hours, and that at Darwin
MacA boarded a train for the remainder of his journey.
Are there no reliable books covering this part of the war?


Chris Mark

From: tomcervo@aol


There are probably some people still working with the Martin Caiden book
Ragged
Rugged Warriors--check the bibliography and adjust your respect accordingly.

I don't see that book in their biblio, but they do list Walter D. Edmonds They
Fought With What They Had. Edmonds was a popular novelist (Drums Along the
Mohawk), not a historian, and he wrote a story with an eye to narrative
excitement rather than strick accuracy. I believe Edmonds wrote, or partly
wrote, the script for that old movie "Air Force" about the B-17s flying out to
Hawaii and the PI just as the Japs bomb Pearl Harbor.

I suppose the official USAAF histories remain the most reliable, although they
have a touching belief that orders and official documents actually have some
bearing on reality.


Chris Mark

From: tomcervo@

There are probably some people still working with the Martin Caiden book
Ragged
Rugged Warriors--check the bibliography and adjust your respect accordingly.

On looking closer I see that Bloody Shambles does indeed include the Caiden
book in its bibliography--a bibliography arranged alphabetically not by author
but by book title, curiously including indefinite article--but not definite
article. Thus the first book listed is "A Flying Tiger's Diary" by Bond
followed by "A Mouse in My Pocket" by Everard and only then "Army Air Forces in
WWII, The," by Craven and Cate The penultimate book is "You'll Die in
Singapore" by McCormac.
The last book is "70 Days in Singapore" by Faulk, listed last, I guess because
the title has a numeral in it--?
Then in the text of the book they have things like "Lt. Roland S. Barnick, who
later wrote: 'Blah blah blah...'" without any footnote or other reference, so
you don't know the source. Turning to the biblio, even if he is the author of
a book they cite, you can't just run down the list. You have to look at each
title individually until you find his name--which I couldn't. So you have no
idea at all what credence to lend to this quote. And you have no way, if you
want more info, to go to the source.

As far as the japanese info, assuming it is accurate, it is interesting--as far
as it goes. i was interested to learn how the japs had had to pull air
resources out of southeast Asia to smash bataan, evening bringing in the big
Sally army bombers. I was even more interested to know how badly hurt they had
been by AAA from the Bataan defenders. But when I wondered what unit with what
weaponry were doing this damage, the text was silent. I also wondered what
altitude the Sallys were bombing from, and if the Jap experience with US Army
AAA at Bataan influenced them to fly at 22,000 feet over port moresby, greatly
reducing their effectiveness, that being ironic because there was no AAA at
Moresby. I was also interested to learn that the Japs bombed the dug in troops
on Bataan with 50kg bombs, and I wondered what genius had decided on that. The
text, of course was silent, the authors not apparently being aware that this
was a futile exercise that almost certainly caused little or no casualties or
damage--but at the cost, according to the text, of a number of "badly damaged"
bombers.
On the subject of the B-17/B-25 raid they include the story that 5 of the B-25s
were sent to a satelite field 40 miles away. True, but not the truth. Because
these five bombers, when they got to Valencia Field, were refused fuel. The
people there were expecting fighter reinforcements to come up from Australia
and they were not about to let some transient bombers suck up their precious
stock. So the B-25s had to head to No.3 (the second take off--in a short
period--without rest since completing their 10-hour hop from Australia; these
guys were beat, and ****ed off, being ordered all over the damned island in
what looked like a classic cluster ****), getting in just as darkness fell, a
pretty close call, the field having no lights. Then the ground crews worked
all night hauling gas in drums up from No. 1 to get them fueled up, not to
mention pulling out their long-range tanks and getting them bombed up, doing
engine service, etc.

I suppose i am beating this to death, but I had high hopes for these expensive
volumes and it looks like the usual rehash, at least as far as US operations
go.

Some questions I would still like to know the answers to:
Why were the 19th BG ground crews at No.3 Del Monte? When did they get there?
Did they ever get out of the PI? What happened to these tired, hungry,
hardworking, apprehensive guys who were promised that they would be picked up
before the Japs got to them?
I would also like to know what actual damage the B-25s did on their raids. BS
only reports the optimistic "believed to have been sunk" reports of the
contemporary press releases and has nothing from any Japanese sources. BS also
doesn't mention the first day attacks on Jap air assets, only the attacks on
shipping.


Chris Mark

On looking closer I see that Bloody Shambles does indeed include the Caiden
book in its bibliography--a bibliography arranged alphabetically not by author

The British may not be as aware of his reputation for fictionalizing.
Caidin is likewise cited in the new book from Grub Street: Buffaloes
Over Singapore
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/AS...f=nosim/annals

The last book is "70 Days in Singapore" by Faulk, listed last, I guess because
the title has a numeral in it--?

The usual rule (at least in the U.S.) is to put numbers first!

As far as the japanese info, assuming it is accurate, it is interesting--as far

It's as accurate as can be done with the sources available. The
Japanese stuff was provided by a Dr Izawa, who is an aviation buff who
has written several books about the Japanese Army Air Force.

as it goes. i was interested to learn how the japs had had to pull air
resources out of southeast Asia to smash bataan, evening bringing in the big
Sally army bombers. I was even more interested to know how badly hurt they had
been by AAA from the Bataan defenders. But when I wondered what unit with what
weaponry were doing this damage, the text was silent. I also wondered what

Well, the Japanese wouldn't have known that! As always, what an
individual writes about his own side is generally fairly close to the
mark. It's when he's writing or yarning about the other side (how many
planes went down, what kind of planes they were) that he goes astray.

altitude the Sallys were bombing from, and if the Jap experience with US Army
AAA at Bataan influenced them to fly at 22,000 feet over port moresby, greatly
reducing their effectiveness, that being ironic because there was no AAA at
Moresby. I was also interested to learn that the Japs bombed the dug in troops
on Bataan with 50kg bombs, and I wondered what genius had decided on that. The

Perhaps all they had? The Japanese were always operating ahead of
their supply line. They set out to invade Burma without drop tanks for
their fighters. That's one reason the first raid on Rangoon was Dec
23, two weeks after the war began.

I suppose i am beating this to death, but I had high hopes for these expensive
volumes and it looks like the usual rehash, at least as far as US operations
go.

I found the Philippines chapters impossibly dull, and concluded that
you had to know something about the campaigns before you could
appreciate Shores & Co's day by day account of the fighting. The Burma
and Malaya accounts do stand up to the closest scrutiny. Can't say
about Indonesia, and I yield to your knowledge on the Philippines.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

see the Warbird's Forum at http://www.danford.net/index.htm
Vietnam | Flying Tigers | Pacific War | Brewster Buffalo | Piper Cub

From: Cub Driver look@

be the material from Japanese sources. That would be completely new.

I guess. I don't know.

Oh, it is. My Flying Tigers book was published in 1991, and it was the
first to identify the Japanese units and airmen who fought in Burma
and China. The Bloody Shambles books came out in 1992, so of course we
didn't have the advantage of one another's work. Hata & Izawa's book
on the JAAF in English translation only came out this year!
www.danford.net/jaaface.htm

The Japanese navy fared better. John Lundstrom's First Team 1984 was
the first to do this kind of research for the navy carrier pilots. The
Hata & Izawa volume on the JNAF came out in English translation in
1989.

The pace has picked up more recently, with a bunch of Osprey books
using Japanese sources, and the Buffaloes Over Singapore book just
published by Grub Street.

There were a few articles published in places like the AAHS Journal
and the British air magazines, but nobody paid any attention to them.

Once information has become accepted, we think it's been around
forever. It's hard to believe that up to October 1991 everyone
accepted without question that the AVG Flying Tigers had fought the
A6M Zero in Burma and China, and most people believed that Japan had
only one (presumably independent) air force.

I picked up a recent book on the war in the Solomons and New Guinea, which was
okay as far as it went. But i stopped reading it because the author did not
have even one Japanese source. In the intro he made some excuse about how hard
it was to get Japanese sources. So what the japs did, how allied actions
affected them, etc., were speculation or based on war-era allied intelligence
estimates. So, for example, the fact that the Japanese military had better maps
of the Solomons than the allies is, according to this author "a mystery." Such
a piece of crap I won't even mention the author or title. He should be
ashamed.
But it's not a lot better with the Med. Everybody knows, for example, about
Omaha Beach, or even Guadalcanal, for that matter. But who knows about the US
Army Ranger units--1st and 3rd Ranger Battalions--that were massacred at
Cisterna. Of 767 men, only 6 escaped. Mention this and get only blank stares
or straight-out disbelief.
It is simply amazing to me that six decades after the war, aside from what
happened in northwest Europe, much of the war remains obscure, what little
written about it all too often riddled with myth, error and nonsense.
I'm glad you've done something to correct that picture.


Chris Mark

Chris, these stories are enough to make a man cry. If you got this
information out of a book, please post the title. On the other hand,
if you didn't, then please write the book and post the title!
--
G Hassenpflug * IJN & JMSDF equipment/history fan