Subject: Death On The North Sea Gunnery Range
From: ELETEME (Kurt R. Todoroff)
Date: 8/11/2004 3:42 PM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id:

You pose a very important situatio. But it is one that can be addressed only
by
tho e who have flown missions or at least have done some military flying. I
was always surprised by how well we were trainrd before we even flew a
mission
When first flying over Germany we never ran into a situation for which we
were
not trained or not prepared.. At first we were placed in the tail- end-
Charlie
slot but as we gained experience we moved forward in the formation and
finally
before the war ended we were connsytantly flying deputy lead. The
experience
enhanced what the training had begun, But without the good background in
training we would not have been able to make the best of the experience. But
the idea that we can go into combat untrained and learn on the job is
lidicrious And if you expect civility on this NG, that is equally
ludicrious.
Good luck.grin)

Art,

You've confused me. I can't find any relevance in your post to the
discussion
at hand. Could you point me to it?

You say that the "important situation" that I pose

"can be addressed only by tho e who have flown missions or at least have done
some military flying".

Isn't this clear from my second post? When you refer to military flying, do
you mean pilots, or do you also include other aircrew members as qualified to
comment?



Kurt Todoroff


Markets, not mandates and mob rule.
Consent, not compulsion.

As I understand it someone talked about training after entering combat.
Right.? And you took issue with that position, as I do. Training must not be
confused with experience. Therefore everyone on the crew who undergoes training
and later experience is qualified on this matter. Those who were never trained
and flew and never had any experience are not qualified to comment.


Arthur Kramer
344th BG 494th BS
England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany
Visit my WW II B-26 website at:
http://www.coastcomp.com/artkramer