ALLIES TRIUMPH

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 87, Issue 64, 18 March 1943, Page 1

ALLIES TRIUMPH

JAPS ANNIHILATED BISMARCK SEA BATTLE Sydney, March 13. Vivid accounts of the big Bismarck Sea Battle in which Allied planes destroyed an entire Jap. convoy of 22 ships, with the loss of thousands of men, were given in a world-wide radio short wave talk by some of the Australian and American pilots who took part in the tight. Major Ken. McCullar, of Mississippi, leader of the Fortress bomber formation, sa'id that although the weather was bad and his formation was split up in the clouds, it scored direct hit* on four ships. He said: "We saw an 8000-ton transport sink immediately from a direct hit. Two others were burning, and the fourth was left sinking. In the afternoon the Fortresses loaded up again with 15 tons of bombs and sank a big transport. Then we got tangled up with Zeros, and shot down six of them. After we beat off the Zero attacks we scored more direct hits on a 10,009-ton transport. "On the second day the shooting really began. Australian pilots flying Beaufighters and Bostorz, bombed and strafed and shot up everything tn the water. I made two runs on a Jap. ship and each time I had to pull out and not bomb it because the Australians. flying at lower altitude, were bombing and blowing hell out of it. They're the craziest flying galoots in the world and they had the time of their lives. Every time I picked a target they beat me to it. "I saw six ships burning at the same time, and they were being bombed from stem to stern. The water was filled with debris, life-boats and dead Japs. Eventually I went away and found a ship of my own, and dropped a bomb in the middle of it. We met very few Zeros. The Lightnings had gone ahead and taken good care of them.

"Beaufighters, Bostons, Mitchells, Lightnings, and Havocs gave the Japs, such a - pasting that I'm sure they never knew what hit them. Their ack-ack never got a real chance to shoot, and only three bursts of fire came anywhere near our plane. It was the best-planned operation I have ever flown in, and I have been in 53 bombardments over a target. The air was so full of shooting that I am sure everybody must have hit something. "Next morning there were only vo ships left sailing under their own steam. A formation of Fortresses and Mitchells bombed one of them simultaneously, and it went up in a cloud of smoke and flame. A few minutes later we dropped four bombs on the other one and left it sinking.”

Wing-Commander B. R. Walker, R.A.F. Beaufighter pilot, said: "The show was a cracker. We will never stop talking about it and about the Yanks. They are the greatest flyers in the world. The thorough organisation made the whole set-up easy for

"Wc flew low over the convoy, and the ack-ack guns opened fire on us, but they were soon silenced. The Japs' ack-ack fire was accurate at first, but it soon became wild and wide. Soon the sea was a mass of wreckage, and of ships afire It was a wonderful sight to see Jap. ships blowing up and burning in all directions. The Zeros did not trouble us very much, because we were too fast for them.”