AIRMEN IN BURMA

Greymouth Evening Star, 23 March 1945, Page 6

AIRMEN IN BURMA

BATTLE OF THE MONSOON

Squadron-Leader E. Michael Salzer writes in the London “Daily Telegraph”:— “Japanese skeletons littering the roads deep into Burma are the grim evidence of the spectacular success of the Third Tactical Air Force in their relentless war on enemy supply lines during the worst monsoon weather for years. During the past months the combined British and American Eastern Air Command strangled Japanese traffic by road, rail, river and sea and starved the forward troops to death. “The Japs, had no choice. They just sat down and 'died. Their food and medical stores exhausted, supplies cut off, air-dropped supply frustrated by the vigilant fighters thousands died of starvation whilst our own troops had everything m plenty—thanks to the R.A.F. and U.S.A.A.F.” That 'is how a senior Army officer described it. How the battle of the rains was won is told by pilots whose flying adventures over Imphal and Arakan, the Chindwin and the Irrawaddy, are more hazardous than on any other battle front.

Nature plays an uncanny game with aircraft in these regions Changes occur with treacherous suddenness, and pilots may suddenly find themselves in one of the dreaded “Cu-Nimbs” —the cumulus nimbus — the turbulent cloud formation which spells danger to any but the most experienced flyer. One Spitfire pilot hit one of these black pillars of cloud and before he knew what had hapnened found himself floating .through the air with bits of his aircraft flying around him. “like dancing matchsticks,” as he described them. AT THE SKY’S MERCY A Hurricane pilot was flying over the Mandalay road, looking for his target, when “suddenly hell broke loose.” He was hurled up “a black shaft scintillating with sharp flashes along dark walls of cloud.” His instruments failed, his aircraft ‘shuddered and shook, creaked and shivered.” How Tie got out of the inferno is still a mystery to him. A Vultee- Vengeance madly tossed about in one of these clouds turned turtle. The air gunner, suddenly suspended in mid-air on his safety belt, thought it was time to bale put. He arrived back at camp three days later after a long jungle trek to find his pilot still wondering how he lost him. , ~ i Many aircraft, including B. 25s (Mitchells) and Dakotas, were sucked up some 10,000 ft whilst officially—that is, according to instruments—flying perfectly level. Then the crews would feel a sensation, somewhat like “going up ,an express elevator of the Empire State building and coming out through the iO pilots have found these clouds rooted in deep narrow gorges, towering to 35,000 ft. They could not fly over or round them and had nc chance to turn back. They would.be suddenly whirled into blinding rainstorms, in which the compass starts spinning; just as suddenly they find themselves in a calm and clear void, with lightning and dense ram in the distance. They talk of St. Elmo fire —blue fldmes dancing over their wings, their propellers seeming alight, and the interior of the aircraft brilliantly illuminated.

VULTURES A MENACE Vultures, hawks, crows, and thousands of waterbirds in flight can .be dangerous. Beauflghters- attacking shipping in the Bay of Bengal pxten have to" fly through swarms of longlegged white birds over tne river deltas They rise like a cloud when thev near anproachmg aircrafi; the sky looks “like after a pillow fight, with feathers whirling round like snowflakes.” One Beaufighter returned with a large buzzard which had jammed the aileron wedged into the leading edge of the port wing. A Hurricane hitting a hawk got into a spin and crashed. Vultures are the most dangerous “heavies”. of Nature’s jungle air force. Stoically they glide over the forests, quite oblivious of .aircraft, leaving avoiding action entirely to the pilot. One station had to scare vultures from the runway by firing Verey lights at them. Nature, too, adds to the adventures of flying over the Burma fronts by the onslaught of its “midget air force —the flies and mosquitoes. The enemy’s ground defences include trip wires across rivers and valleys, machine-gun nests in trees, and the “suicide defence” of blanketing a target with heavy ack-ack exploding as low as 501 t to luUlt above tbe ground—a barrage as dangerous for the gunners as for the attackers. But neither these nor his fighters are so much feared or cause more casualties among our low-ftymg aircraft than the rigours of monsoon and jungle conditions. I mentioned the valiant work ol the Air Force’s ground crews. Incessant rains or . scorching heat have made repair and servicing a severe test of human endurance. Aircraft can take off or land in most weathers, but mechanics cannot get at the engines in the rain. In tropical conditions corrosion sets in within minutes. An engineer. officer of a transport squadron decided that the best method to keep the aircraft serviceable was—to fly. them, to prevent corrosion in the rain. Sometimes the sun is so fierce that no work can be done on the aircraft in norma] working hours. An egg cracked on the wing would “set almost immediately; it was impossible for fitters to climb on to the aircraft. Inside the fuselage of bombers or Dakotas crews could only work m short spells in a temperature like that of a baking oven. Few R.A.F .pilots have seen the Japanese, on the ground or in the air. Once again Nature helps the enemy in the matter of camouflage. Maps' often bear little resemblance to actual ground, conditions, for hills and rivers are not always correctly charted: seasonal waterways created by floods are not shown. Colouring and outline of landscape will change from hour to hour.

“INVISIBLE” TAR GETS

Landmarks are difficult to' find when green valleys turn into brown rivers overnight or yellow patches into green fields. Clouds, waterspouts and ground mist make it even harder to find a target well camouflaged, as it always is, in dense jungle or overgrown waterways. Yet thousands of trucks, river boats, railway trucks and enemy hutments have been destroyed from the air just the same. Sometimes the pilots attacked “invisible” targets, pinpoints given to them by Army observers. On one occasion a “recce” reported' 200 Japanese with mules in the hills. Ground crews were instructed to fit special long-range tanks on the Spitfires, and worked all night by the light of truck headlights. At dawn the squadrons took off, but they returned “cheesed off.” “Not a thing to be seen”—so the pilots had sprayed the jungle with their guns. Next morning a gro.und patrol reported 70 Japanese soldiers dead and 50 mules killed in that particular area. Six Hurricanes returned from their sortie over the jungle, where they bombed a certain area, -with the unanimous verdict, “Waste of time Nothing at all to be seen.” The Army signalled shortly afterwards: “Air attack most successful. Several hundred Japanese casualties." Burmese villagers, their raw shoulders as evidence, reported that they had to evacuate enemy casualties for 24 hours after the sortie. | As I said, few airmen have a chance actually to see the enemy; but’ sometimes they come across a “dream target.” There was a congestion of

enemy soldiers, for instance, waiting to use a wire trolley-bridge across the Chaung River. It could take only two men at a time. The Spitfires killed a hundred who were waiting their turn. Returning from a raid on shipping a Beaufighter crew saw Japanese soldiers lined up on a road. 'Turning round they mowed them down before the parade could be dismissed. Later it was confirmed that they killed nearly 100 Japanese officers under training. Another Beaufighter saw some Japanese bathing in the sea. When the plane turned about they scurried for shelter, so the Beaufighter promptly set the whole camp on fire. On the Tiddin Road there arc hundreds of wrecked enemy vehicles, and many tanks which have been destroyed by bombs or cannon shells. A staff car which had been strafed by Spitfires was found under a tree south of Tamu. Inside were the remains of a Japanese general and his A.D.C.

These incidents are all representative of the pattern of flying operations by the Tactical Air Force in Eastern Air Command. They • form part of the mosaic of a picture which in its sum portrays a supreme effort by flying men and ground crews in braving the monsoons, undeterred by hazards and handicaps. Here was an air victory achieved under conditions .in which flying has never been atempted before, conditions in which, on a more “normal” battlefront, flying would have been cancelled most of the time.