Subject: WWII-L Digest - 14 Nov 1994 to 15 Nov 1994

From: Automatic digest processor <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 16 Nov 1994 00:06:12 -0500

There are 47 messages totalling 1775 lines in this issue.

Topics of the day:

  1. INF: USN Chronology 11-15-94
  2. Charles A Lindberg (3)
  3. Lindbergh (2)
  4. INF: 50 Years Ago - 16-NOV-1944
  5. WEAP: P-38 in the Pacific (Part 5)
  6. NEWS OF SIDNEY
  7. MEMOIRS (3)
  8. GEN: Renegade Officers in WW2 (3)
  9. TUSKEGEE AIRMEN (FWD) (2)
 10. HIST-THE STUDY OF THE
 11. REMEMBRANCE EVENTS
 12. REMEMBERANCES ON V (6)
 13. HIST-THE STUDY OF (2)
 14. INF: 50 Years Ago Archives Moved
 15. Orders
 16. Yamamoto
 17. WEAP:  CV-8 USS Hornet (2)
 18. Enigma
 19. PRESERVING DOCUMENTS (2)
 20. 50TH: BATTLE OF THE HUERTGEN FOREST (2)
 21. Re bomb disposal (was MEDIA V1)
 22. Dieppe Raid in 1942 (2)
 23. WEAP: P-38 in the Pacific (Part 6)
 24. help
 25. INF: Byrd Archives (2)
 26. 99th Inf. Div. Reunion
 27. Cannibalism in other theaters
 28. [INF] USAAF 16 NOV 44

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Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 04:00:20 PST
From:    "Keller, Theron P." <[email-masked]>
Subject: INF: USN Chronology 11-15-94

UNITED STATES NAVY CHRONOLOGY
from:
//byrd.mu.wvnet.edu/pub/history/military/wwii/naval_chronology/chr4(4,5).txt

1944
11/15 Wed. Army troops supported by naval gunfire land in the
           Mapia Islands off the northwest coast of New Guinea.

Information compiled by U.S. Navy Historians.  For more information,
contact the Naval Historical Center at (202) 433-3940.
Archived by: Larry Jewell <[email-masked]>
Posted by:
Theron P. Keller
Logicon, Inc.
Dahlgren, VA  22448 USA
[email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 07:04:00 EST
From:    mc killop <[email-masked]>
Subject: Charles A Lindberg

 >On Mon, 14 Nov 1994, Patrick Charles wrote:
 >
 >>         That was an interesting article about Lindberg's war record.
 >> However, the line about Lindberg's actions demonstrating that he was not
 >> a pacifist was intriguing.  Was the beef against Lindberg that he was a
 >> pacifist or that he was "Pro-German"?
 >>         Any comments?
 >>
 >> Patrick Charles
 >> [email-masked]

 >T Lewis responded
 >
 >I don't know about how others on the list feel, but Lindberg always
 >struck me as more of a "defeatist" than a pacifist, and not overly
 >"pro-German," although some of his comments were read that way.
 >
 >"T"

If I remember correctly, Lindberg went to Germany in the late 30's
at the invitation of Goering and came home "praising" the Luftwaffe
and indicating that we didn't have a chance against them.  He then
got involved with the America First movement which fought FDR on
Lend-Lease, our involvement in the European War, etc.  As a result,
FDR did not like Lindberg and when Charles tried to get into the US
military after Pearl Harbor, his commission was blocked on FDR's
orders.  The only way he got into the war was as a rep for United
Aircraft.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
|  Jack McKillop              |  Those who have long enjoyed such |
|  Bellcore                   |  privileges as we enjoy forget in |
|  Piscataway, NJ USA         |  time that men have died to win   |
|  [email-masked]  |  them.                     FDR    |
-------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 07:15:00 EST
From:    mc killop <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Lindbergh

 >An aside on Lindy --  a book just out this year contends that
 >Lindy faked the kidnapping of his son for which Bruno
 >Hauptman was executed.  Clearly he was an incredibly complex
 >and contradictory human being.
 >
 >Mike Turton

As a native New Jerseyian who is pushing 60, I remember  hearing
the "old people" talking in my youth and one of the most
controversial issues was Hauptman's guilt or innocence.  It was a
subject avoided in bars because of it's inflammatory nature.

Hauptman's wife died recently and she went to her grave fighting to
exonerate her husband.  I have studied the case informally and I
don't know whether Hauptman did it or not but there is an odor
about the whole thing.  Mrs. Hauptman fought with the New Jersey
State Police for years trying to get them to release evidence; they
did release some but I just wonder if something isn't buried
somewhere that is assuming it was not destroyed years ago.

As far as the new book is concerned, I believe the author claims
that a woman who was a relative accidently killed the kid and they
went to great lengths to cover it up.  Nice conspiracy theory but I
often ask myself if these things are true, how do they remain
covered up for all those years.  The average person has the habit
of talking too much, in many cases to make themselves seem
important to others, and the more people that know, the more the
probability that  someone will talk.
~r .signature

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 07:42:27 -0500
From:    "Steven Pudlo, Dept. Computer Svcs." <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Lindbergh

Jeez, Jack;

Yankee magazina about a year ago ran an article that implied that
Lucky himself did it...

We ALL know it was a government conspiracy, done by those folks who
gave us JFK...
                                                        Steve

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Steven E. Pudlo  - [email-masked] |"Life may be a drag...
STC Programmer/Analyst - (203) 885-2343  |    But it sure beats the
Three Rivers Community-Technical College |       only known alternative"
574 New London Turnpike                  |                     (S.E.P.)
Norwich, CT. U.S.A. 06360                |No one gets out of it alive..
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

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Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 04:54:05 -0800
From:    John Davis <[email-masked]>
Subject: INF: 50 Years Ago - 16-NOV-1944

On 16-NOV-1944, the following occurred -

World War II - The Battlefronts
-------------------------------
U.S. War Casualties -

             Oct. 1944   Since Dec. 7, 1941

Dead           19,183          109,265
Wounded        56,548          258,654
Missing         6,023           62,933
Prisoners       4,903           58,108
               ------          -------
Total          86,657          488,960

Western Front - The US 1st and 9th Armies launch a co-ordinated offensive
to seize the flat country north of Aachen (Operation Queen). The XIX Corps
(9th Army) is advancing north of Aachen towards the Rur. The VII Corps (1st
Army) advances towards Duren and Cologne, east of Aachen. In the US 3rd
Army sector, the XII and XX Corps continue to advance. Units of the 6th
Armoured Division and the 80th Division launch an offensive against
Faulquemont.

Philippines (Leyte) - The fighting continues on Breakneck Ridge. The 24th
Division advances from Jaro towards Ormoc.

Burma - Strong Japanese resistance is still holding up the British 36th
Division in the Pinwe Area.

The Homefront
-------------
Stilwell Praises Troops - General Joseph W. Stilwell (recently removed from
command of the Allied forces in China) said yesterday in a press
conference from his home in Carmel, California that American service men
"are keenly intelligent, have lots of initiative, are amenable to
discipline and understand thoroughly team play" and adds that this is "more
true of Americans than any others I have seen." He refused to discuss
China.

Jackie Cooper - Jackie Cooper (whose last film "Where Are Your Children?"
dealt with juvenile delinquency and acquitted last month of contributing to
the delinquency of two teenages girls) has "washed out" as a V-12 naval
trainee at the University of Notre Dame because of scholastic difficulties.
He has been transferred to the Great Lakes Naval Training Station as an
apprentice seaman.

Army & Navy
-----------
Commutation - President Roosevelt interceded last week to save a combat
soldier from disgrace of dismissal from the Army. Home after piloting
heavy bombers on 25 combat missions over Europe, one day last spring
Captain Pervis Youree brought his B-17 Flying Fortress up alongside and
kept pace with a lumbering Braniff airliner. For this serious
indiscretion he was court-martialed and sentenced to a dishonorable
discharge. Appeals to General Henry H. Arnold, who was disturbed by
accidents resulting from such antics, got nowhere.  Friends of Youree then
went to the President. Youree did not get off scot-free; his sentence was
commuted to a $1,000 fine.

=============================================================================

Sources: "2194 Days of War" by Cesare Salmaggi and Alfredo Pallavisimi, "The
World Almanac Book Of WW II" by Peter Young, "Facts On File Yearbook 1944,
Person's Index Of World Events" edited by R.L. Lapica and "Time" magazine.

Previous articles are archived at ftp.netcom.com in directory /pub/jbd and can
be accessed via the WWW by URL: ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/jbd/ww2.html. If you
have difficulty accessing the Netcom FTP server, please keep trying because it
stays very busy.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
John Davis     [email-masked]
Cary, N.C.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 08:02:09 EDT
From:    "Steve L. New" <[email-masked]>
Subject: WEAP: P-38 in the Pacific (Part 5)

Wings Magazine
4 August 1978

"The P-38 Lightning in the Pacific, the Aleutians, China-Burma-India

By,
Warren M. Bodie

TOP OF THE THIRTEENTH

Few commanders who flew fighters in the war enjoyed more personal
popularity than Lt. Col. Robert B. Westbrook, a character right out
of the movie scripts and a real-life resident of Hollywood,
California. He was handsome, had a good personality, flew P-38s with
great skill and his leadership qualities were outstanding. But,
like several of his contemporaries, he pushed his luck too far.

Most of the airmen and groundcrew members had passed through the
evening chow line by the time they learned that "Westy" Westbrook
would not be returning to his Dutch New Guinea base at Middelburg
Island off the northern coast of New Guinea. His 339th Fighter
Squadron mates (347FG) were late in returning from the 1900-miles
mission to Makasar Strait, vividly pointing out the fabulous range
capabilities of the P-38Ls. By the next morning the death of "Westy"
was known to thousands of Allied combat men as far north as Morotai
and Leyte and south-east to Biak and Hollandia. Even pilots in
Australian R & R camps knew about the loss by noon. There was a
widespread feeling of almost personal loss among the fighting
veterans of the sprawling Pacific battle zone. Men who had known the
best - from "Buzz" Wagner and Tommy Lynch to Dick Bong and Tommy
McGuire - looked upon Westbrook as one of the greatest combat fighter
pilots of the war.  Participating in aerial battles from Henderson
Field at Guadalcanal to the wilds of Borneo, the 27-year-old from Los
Angeles county had dispatched no less than twenty Japanese fighters.
At the time of his death, he was the leading ace of the Thirteenth
Air Force, and nobody in that command ever exceeded his score.

Few pilots of the 13th's jungle air force will forget Westbrook's
inspired and aggressive leadership as commander of the "Vampires"
squadron (44FS, 18FG) during the intensive attack on Rabaul.  Those
same men will recall his victory spree during Christmas week in 1943
when he nailed six Japanese aircraft in three days over New Britain.
As might be expected of men like Westbrook and Robert DeHaven,
"Westy" once took singer-actress Frances Langford (touring with the
Bob Hope Troupe) for a piggy-back ride in a P-38.

While he was a "pilot's pilot," Westbrook was also a crew chief's
pilot. He often worked for hours on his own airplane to make sure he
didn't miss any missions. He had an intense interest in aircraft
maintenance, which inspired many others in the "Vampire" squadron
to work out the bugs in their own fighters on those hot and humid
flight lines throughout the Solomons and New Guinea.

As his group commander, Lt. Col. Leo F. Dusard said, "Westy knew
everybody. Not just the officers, but also the G.I.s, and not just in
the Air Corps (sic) but also in the infantry and every other branch
that we've worked with."

The 6-foot 2-inch Westbrook was a member of the California National
Guard, before the war, having been ROTC cadet captain at Hollywood
High School. He went on active duty when President Roosevelt
proclaimed a state of national emergency in 1940, going on to gain
his commission at Infantry OCS before going to flight training.

Westbrook had completed 367 combat missions, totaling 554 combat
hours when he met his fate. Awards received included the DSC, Silver
Star, DFC and Air Medal with fifteen Oak Leaf Clusters. He was
inclined to dislike glamorization and was adamant in pointing out
the importance of teamwork and the fact that shooting down enemy
aircraft was "partly luck in being at the right place at the right
lime."

His final mission involved a 950-mile-radius overwater flight to
strafe an enemy airfield in the Celebes and enemy shipping in
Makassar Strait on November 22, 1944. Such a mission would have been
impossible a year earlier and certainly not possible without the
P-38. It was "Westy's" first mission of his eighth combat tour of
duty.

Leading a flight from the "Sunsetters" (339th) squadron, top outfit
Of the 13th Air Force, he made two passes at Japanese freighters in
Makassar Town harbor. Within seconds of the first pass, he came to
realize that a 140-foot enemy gunboat was making the assault by the
Lightnings very hazardous. Charging in at the vessel, he was scoring
hits when flak hit his aircraft and his right engine virtually
erupted in flames. The C.O. of the "Sunsetters" squadron, Major John
Endress, yelled at him to feather his engine.  "I think I'm okay."
Westy called back calmly. Down to 700 feet, his plane was setting up
for a wet landing (not really recommended in a P-38) when it suddenly
dove straight into the sea, disintegrating on impact. Westbrook's
parachute bobbed to the surface along with one aileron, but there was
no sign of the fighter ace.  The flak gunboat was left with only one
battery in commission and the vessel was listing badly from
Westbrook's assault. His wingman had also peppered the ship very
heavily. Thus ended the life and career of yet another top notch
fighter ace.

Steve New

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 08:58:38 -0500
From:    Ben Frank <[email-masked]>
Subject: NEWS OF SIDNEY

For those on the list who have wondered that we have had no posts from Sidney
Allinson, be informed that his Victoria net has been down for several weeks and
he will be back as soon as that happens. Ben Frank

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 09:24:13 -0500
From:    Ben Frank <[email-masked]>
Subject: MEMOIRS

Terry, putting our collections on laser disk is one of our projects for the
future. As we have just recently--within the past five years--really entered
the computer world, we have not yet set priorities for what is to be recorded
on laser disk, when, and how. We have our museum collections of uniforms,
weapons, medals, swords, and the like. We also have our Reference Sections many
files of personalities, events, units, commands, bases, operations, etc. The
first thing we have done which we have available on disk is a pretty good
bibliography re/the Marine Corps and World War II. We know about the Air and
Space Museum's laser disk which contains its entire collection of pictures of
aircraft with descriptors and the like. I think we are entering an age, or have
already entered it where vast collections of material can be made immediately
available to researchers. The problem for institutions starting such programs
is, first, where to get the money to undertake such ventures, and second, where
do you start? Which collection? And, also related to money, who is to do it? Do
you get the people to do such things out of your own hide? There is and has
been for some while a hiring freeze in the Department of Defense, so we can get
no new people to do all this. It is so bad, that if we lose a body, we also
lose a billet, unless it is such an important billet that we have to have it
filled, we probably can hire, but only after a full justification. To carry
this thread on a bit further, there is current in DOD an order or regulation
which says that no billets and/or promotions to GS-14 and above can be
filled/made without the permission of one of the DepSecDefs, and in order to
have "diversification" it has to be shown why a minority was not chosen to fill
that billet. I've been carried away and have gone into it much more than I
meant, Terry, I trust that you have borne with me. Ben Frank

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 21:46:57 +0700
From:    "Peter E. Beal" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: GEN: Renegade Officers in WW2

On Mon, 14 Nov 1994, Bengt Nilsson wrote:

> >Hello everyone! > > > >I was trying to come up with instances where
officers explicitly > >disobeyed orders, and could only come up with a few
realtively benign > >examples.  I refer to them as 'benign' because they
countermanded orders > >that were somewhat extreme. > > Since you
mentioned 1943 you are perhaps already aware of what happened when > SS
General Paul Hausser was explicitly ordered to defend Charkov to the last
> man. He tried to persuade his superior officers that it was madness, and
> finally appealed to Hitler himself. Permission was denied but he
evacuated > all the same. > > I suppose your interest is limited to WWII.
I'm sure there are > numerous examples throughout history. > > Bengt
Nilsson > [email-masked] > SS Obergruppenfuhrer Felix Steiner, who
commanded the remnants of some units which had retreated west of Berlin in
mid-April, 1945, was ordered to attack towards Berlin and break the siege
thereof.  Several times he disregarded direct orders, including those
brought by the regular Army general who was to take over in the event he
refused once again.  Steiner's attack was never launched and no effective
action was taken against him, at least by Hitler.

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 09:50:11 -0500
From:    Ben Frank <[email-masked]>
Subject: TUSKEGEE AIRMEN (FWD)

To find out more about the Tuskegee Airmen, I think that you would want to read
the biography of Gen Chappy James. Ben Frank

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 09:54:00 -0500
From:    Ben Frank <[email-masked]>
Subject: HIST-THE STUDY OF THE

Drew, as both an historian of the Okinawa campaign as well as a veteran of
ICEBERG, I will try to answer your questions. First of all, the ICEBERG
landings on Okinawa were, I believe, larger than Overlord, at least I have
written than in three histories of the operation, and my statement was based on
a comparison of ships, men, etc. I don't have the facts handy, but if
interested, I can look it up. I cannot answer you why the Pacific War is
currently a sideshow except to say that the WWII Commemoration Committee in DOD
is in charge of the official commemorations, and for some unknown but in any
case unacceptable reason, outside of commemorating Pearl Harbor, Guadalcanal,
and Iwo Jima and Okinawa coming up, the rest of the major landings in the
Pacific have been overlooked by all except the veterans of those campaigns,
many of whom returned to Guam, for instance, or Midway, or Wake for the last
time. As I was in it, I cannot tell you how the Pacific War was viewed at home,
and I knew little about what was going on in Europe except for D-Day in 1944,
but at that time, we in the 1st Marine Division were getting ready for our
Peleliu landing in September, and that was a major operation which was just
absolutely overlooked, especially in the newspapers, which have, for the most
part--and this is a generalization, so take it for that--have a bunch of young
whippersnappers who couldn't give a fig for WWII, know little or nothing about
it and don't care to learn about it. OK, that's off my chest. Re/27th Infantry
Division, it was a New York National Guard outfit which the Army, unlike it did
in the cases of other National Guard units,
did not break up and scatter the New Yorkers to other outfits and bring in
other soldiers to take their places. As a result, the company commander could
have been a shoe clerk (sorry, shoe clerks) under whom served teachers,
bankers, and the like.
A lot of the senior officers were politicians and so it was in a sense an
inbred unit. It did not acquit itself well on a minor operation, the landing on
Makin, for which, together with Tarawa, MajGen Holland M. Smith, USMC, was in
command. He was not impressed with its lack of aggressiveness, and the time it
took for it to capture Makin caused the Navy to remain to safeguard the troops
on shore, and in the end, caused the sinking of an escort carrier with heavy
loss of life. The 27th was not aggressive on Saipan, where Holland Smith
removed its commander, MajGen Ralph Smith, and that caused great anti-Marine
Corps feeling in the Army. Finally, on Okinawa, again it was not aggressive and
was relieved on line by the 1st Marine Division and it was sent north to occupy
and police an area already captured by the 6th Marine Division. No, Drew, the
27th Infantry Division was not given a bum rap. It did have a poor record. I
can go on, but this should hold you for a while. I will be glad to answer any
other questions you may have about Okinawa. Ben Frank

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 09:56:25 -0500
From:    Ben Frank <[email-masked]>
Subject: REMEMBRANCE EVENTS

Thanks for your moving report, Steve, and yes, God Bless them All. Ben Frank

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 09:56:32 -0500
From:    Ben Frank <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: REMEMBERANCES ON V

Not so, Steve. Veterans' Day was originally Armistice Day to commemorate the
11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month in 1918 when an end to the war
came, and so commemorates the veterans of WWI living and dead. Memorial Day was
established originally to commemorate the veterans of the Civil War, I believe,
or so I recall. Ben Frank

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 09:56:39 -0500
From:    Ben Frank <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: HIST-THE STUDY OF

Cassady, Harry Gailey's book is totally biased and I have told him that many
times, especially when he was writing it. It so happens that Harry, then a
professor at San Jose State in California met MajGen Ralph Smith, USA, Ret.,
who then lived in either Menlo Park and Los Altos, and became interested in the
Smith vs Smith controversey. Harry would not listen to persuasion or
documentation showing how Holland Smith had done the proper thing and had the
support of both Kelly Turner and Spruance in the relieve. If you like, I can
send you a paper I did on the subject. But please don't use Gailey's book for a
primary source, nor use Holland Smith's Coral and Brass, which is also slanted.
Ben Frank

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 07:17:22 -0800
From:    John Davis <[email-masked]>
Subject: INF: 50 Years Ago Archives Moved

I have moved the "50 Years Ago" archives to a new location. This new
location will make it alot easier for you to access the archives. If you
have any difficulty accessing the archives at its new location, please
let me know as soon as possible.

The best way to access the "50 Years Ago" archives is through the World
Wide Web. The WWW URL is "http://www.webcom.com/~jbd/ww2.html".  You may
also download the files by anonymous FTP. I have included instructions for
doing this below.

Instructions for downloading files by FTP -

The 50 YA articles are stored by month. To retrieve the articles by FTP,
open host "ftp.webcom.com", enter "anonymous" when prompted for login ID,
enter your Internet mail address when prompted for password. To change to
the directory where the articles are stored enter "cd /pub/jbd/www". Enter
command "ls" to get a listing of all the files available. The file name
identifies the month for 50 YA articles (example - sep1944.txt, contains
the September 1944 articles).

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
John Davis     [email-masked]
Cary, N.C.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 10:26:45 -0500
From:    Michael Andrew Turton <[email-masked]>
Subject: Orders

        What about the refusal by the German commander to burn Paris?
        How 'bout that helicopter commander at Mai Lai who threatened
to turn his guns on the US troops?
        What happened to those Japanese who disobeyed the Imperial
order to surrender?

Mike Turton
[email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 10:22:48 -0500
From:    "david j. gorman" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: MEMOIRS

Dear sir,
I came in to your list service in the middle of this correspondence about
good authors of narratives on the second World War.  I am a student at
the University of Michigan, and although I am not majoring in history, it
is one of my hobbies.  I just wanted you to know that I have found Robert
Leckie to be one of the best military history writers around.  If you are
looking for an author for your students to read, Leckie would be a
possibility.  Hope this is helpful.

David Gorman
[email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 07:35:19 -0800
From:    John Riegsecker <[email-masked]>
Subject: Yamamoto

Those interested in the Yamamoto attack might also want to read
_Attack on Yamamoto_ by Carroll V. Glines (1990).  There is little doubt in
his mind that Barber, and not Lanphier shot down Yamamoto.  He paints a
pretty dark picture of Lanphier as a man who told comrades that he was
there to get a war record in order to become president of the United
States.  Lanphier did become involved with politics, working with Stuart
Symington.  I'm just reporting what I've read, I have no way of really
checking.  I've read other books by Glines but don't know much about him.

John Riegsecker                                 (206) 756-3566
Dept of Mathematics and Computer Science        [email-masked]
University of Puget Sound

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 09:43:31 -0600
From:    "Robert J. Granvin" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: TUSKEGEE AIRMEN (FWD)

> To find out more about the Tuskegee Airmen, I think that you would want to read
> the biography of Gen Chappy James. Ben Frank

Excellent book.  Also try and locate "Lonely Eagles".  This is a "privately"
published book by the Tuskegee Airmen, Inc.  I've seen it in both hardcover
and softcover.  All proceeds from the book go to the Tuskegee's Scholarship
Fund.  The book is written by Dr. Rose and is fairly small, but a good
overview history of the 332nd FG and includes a lot of photos.

We have the hardcovers available in our Wing's PX, but I've also heard it has
been found in several libraries.

--
\\ Robert J. Granvin                                 User Services Specialist
// School of Statistics - University of Minnesota            [email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 11:05:35 EST
From:    Cassady Craft <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: WEAP:  CV-8 USS Hornet

Jorge, I have always thought of the Hornet, Yorktown and Enterprise as in the
same class.  Wasp was a single ship class, maybe even closer to Ranger in
size, but quite better in capability.  However, this is how I remember, not
what I can "prove" to you.

Cassady Craft
Department of Political Science
University of Georgia
e-mail [email-masked]
or
[email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 10:08:30 -0600
From:    Terrence Lindell <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Enigma

Tim Watts asked whether the Germans learned anything about the
breaking of the Enigma codes in the aftermath of their victory in
France.

One of the most useful works on ULTRA that I have found is David Kahn's
SEIZING THE ENIGMA:  THE RACE TO BREAK THE GERMAN U-BOAT CODES,
1939-1943.  He does a good job at setting the background of code-
breaking in the Allied camp.

He does not deal with the issue of French intelligence files, but
he notes that the codebreaking crew managed to flee, first to
North Africa, and then to the unoccupied part of France, where
they continued to work. They radioed their solutions to England.
When the Germans seized the rest of France following the Allied
invasion of North Africa, most managed to get away and reach
England.  Those who were captured apparently convinced the Germans
that they had not been successful in penetrating Enigma.  See
Kahn, pp. 115-116 for further details.

Terry Lindell
Department of History
Wartburg College
Waverly, Iowa  50677
[email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 10:25:55 -0600
From:    Terrence Lindell <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: MEMOIRS

Ben,

Thanks for the reply about the laserdisc project.  I understand the
economics of the matter.  I have been encouraging state historical
societies in the midwest to consider laserdisc collections that would
be useful in teaching state history.  While everyone thinks it would
be a nice idea, the funds aren't currently available.

You mentioned a USMC bibliography on disc.  Is that available to the
public generally or only accessible on site?

For those of you whom I have misled with the flag above, my
apologies.  I'm still getting the hang of e-mail.  I will say
one thing about memoirs to make this relevant.  A number of you
suggested Saburo Sakai's Samurai as a good personal narrative from
the Japanese perspective.  Although the Naval Institute Press has
recently re-issued it in hardback, it is not currently available
in paperback.

Terry Lindell
Department of History
Wartburg College
Waverly, Iowa  50677
[email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 09:03:00 +0100
From:    JOHN AUSLAND <[email-masked]>
Subject: PRESERVING DOCUMENTS

  November 15, 1994

  There have been a number of messages recently about preserving documents.  Let
me offer another option: turn them over to professionals.
  I have been gradually copying the wartime letters I drew upon in my book
LETTERS HOME and mailing the originals to the US Army Military History Institute
at Carlisle Barracks in Pennsylvania.  This way the copies will be available to
my children after my death, but the originals will be available to researchers
indefinitely.
  Regards, John Ausland/Oslo Norway

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 09:26:36 +0100
From:    JOHN AUSLAND <[email-masked]>
Subject: 50TH: BATTLE OF THE HUERTGEN FOREST

  November 15, 1994
  The Battle of the Bulge, which began on December 16, was the climax of the
fighting that went on during the winter of 1944-45.
  After the failure of Market-Garden, the Allied forces settled down for a war
of attrition.  Eisenhower decided to engage in actions which were calculated to
kill two Germans for every allied soldier.  The result was a lot of tough
fighting on many parts of the front.  For me and many others, that meant the
battle of the Huertgen Forest, a pointless effort to capture a patch of woods
south of Aachen which chewed up five US divisions.
  Here is the introduction to Chapter 12 of my book LETTERS HOME: A WAR MEMOIR,
which is devoted to this largely forgotten battle:

          * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
          *                                                         *
          *                 THE HUERTGEN FOREST                     *
          *                                                         *
          * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

          If war is hell, the Huertgen Forest was worse. No one who
          was there and came out of it alive, and many did not, can
          ever forget it. To say it was a nightmare is an
          understatement. Patton described it as an "epic of stark
          infantry combat." This description, however, glorifies a brutal
          and purposeless military operation, which chewed up five US
          Army infantry divisions. One of these was the 4th.

          Before moving to my letters, it is necessary to set the stage.
          The allied forces which swept across France arrived at the
          German border exhausted, both the men and equipment.
          The supply lines from Normandy were too long. As a result
          of Montgomery's abortive efforts to make up for the failure
          of Market-Garden, he delayed destroying the German forces
          which were preventing the use of the port of Antwerp.
          Therefore, it did not become available until the end of
          November. General Bradley, in his A Soldier's Story, called
          Montgomery's delay in taking on this task "an irrevocable
          logistical loss to the Allies."

          Eisenhower wanted to get on with the campaign but had to
          devote a great deal of time to problems with the British and
          French. Both disapproved of his conduct of the war. Aside
          from personalities, the key issue with the British was
          whether the Allied forces should make a one or two pronged
          drive into Germany. Montgomery wanted to concentrate on
          a drive in the north toward Berlin. Bradley wanted to make
          a two pronged attack to isolate the Ruhr. After considerable
          wrangling, Eisenhower approved Bradley's strategy. This
          called for attacks all along the front in November.

          The 4th Division's task was to clear the Huertgen Forest,
          the fourth division sacrificed to this mission. These wooded
          hills were in the First Army sector, commanded by General
          Courtney R. Hodges. Specifically, we were in the VIIth Corps,
          commanded by Lt. Gen. J. Lawton Collins. This was the
          same corps the division was with during the landing and
          breakout.

          Fearing to have his forces advance south of Aachen with the
          forest on his right flank, Collins had decided it essential to
          clear the Germans from it. I am not the only one who finds
          this decision difficult to understand. The German generals
          were also puzzled why we did not just block the few roads
          running through the forest and go around. Since, however,
          Collins elected to fight in this forbidding terrain, the
          Germans had little choice but to defend it.

          The decision to conquer this forest at great cost is even
          more puzzling when one takes into account the dams on the
          River Roer. Even if we had got through the forest, we could
          not have gone much further. The Germans would have used
          the dams, as they did later, to flood the area east of the
          forest. The puzzle therefore is: why did we not concentrate
          on capturing the dams rather than the forest? Before trying
          to answer this question, I will try to show you what three
          weeks in hell was like.

          The 4th moved into an assembly area near Zweifall, just
          west of the forest, on November 7. Before arriving there, the
          12th Regiment was thrown into battle suddenly in the
          middle of the night to rescue a badly mauled regiment of
          the 28th Division. This misbegotten operation had two
          results. Col. James S. Luckett was relieved of command of
          the 12th, and the regiment was not in condition to be of
          much help in the forest.  Copyright 1993 John C. Ausland

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 09:18:37 PST
From:    "Mark H. Walter" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re bomb disposal (was MEDIA V1)

> Reading this post and several in the recent past about dangerous
>positions in the war has reminded me of a series PBS broadcast 13 - 14 years
>ago.  I think it was on MASTERPIECE THEATER, and was a "doc-u-drama
>format".  The name of the show was UXB (unexploded bomb).  It dealt with the
>British military bomb squads who were responsible for defusing and
>disarming all the unexploded bombs which would show up following a
>bombing raid.  The narrator stated two interesting things.  The
>casualty rate was extremely high for these men, and after a man had been in
>the position for a certain time he could transfer out, but very few
>would. It seems they preferred to stay on this job.

You might be interested in a book about the same subject.

   Unexploded bomb     by   Major A. B. Hartley

There are no exact numbers for the number of men assigned to bomb disposal or
what the casualty rate was other than to say it was very high at first.  It
wasn't voluntary, however after 6 months a transfer could be requested.  The
author only knew 1 man who did transfer.  He briefly goes over the efforts
in Japan and Germany to deal with their bomb problems.   The Germans were
well organized but suffered from a lack of cooperation between the different
military branches.  For example the Luftwaffe wouldn't let the disposal people
see their own fuzes.  Japan's efforts were almost nonexistent.  He mentions a
Japanese scientist saying their methods were so primitive that the scientist
feared he would not be believed.

                             Mark Walter   [email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 10:52:31 MST
From:    Anwar Kassam <[email-masked]>
Subject: Dieppe Raid in 1942

I am coaching some high school students on a debate "Be it resolved that
Churchill's decision on Dieppe Raid was sound". Are there any opinions
or views on this topic? Are there any historical documents on this topic
on the internet? Thanks in advance.

[email-masked]
Anwar Kassam

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 14:39:29 -0330
From:    Stephen Cloutier <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Charles A Lindberg

On Tue, 15 Nov 1994, mc killop wrote:

>
> If I remember correctly, Lindberg went to Germany in the late 30's
> at the invitation of Goering and came home "praising" the Luftwaffe
> and indicating that we didn't have a chance against them.  He then
> got involved with the America First movement which fought FDR on
> Lend-Lease, our involvement in the European War, etc.  As a result,
> FDR did not like Lindberg and when Charles tried to get into the US
> military after Pearl Harbor, his commission was blocked on FDR's
> orders.  The only way he got into the war was as a rep for United
> Aircraft.
>

  I heard it this way.  He was invited by Goring, and Joseph Kennedy
encouraged him to go to collect information on the German air power.
He was so impressed with it that he felt that Germany would win any
air war and further Kennedy's isolationism.  He was presented with a
medal, but he was not aware that the Germans would present it.  This
meant that he did not know what to do and accepted it because he didn't
want to offend the Germans.
  I read this account in John Weis' *Hitler's Diplomat*, a biography
of Ribbentrop.

Steve Cloutier
Memorial University
St. John's, Newfoundland
Canada
e-mail: [email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 13:20:40 -0400
From:    "Steven C. Salina" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: REMEMBERANCES ON V

> Not so, Steve. Veterans' Day was originally Armistice Day to commemorate the
> 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month in 1918 when an end to the war
> came, and so commemorates the veterans of WWI living and dead. Memorial Day was
> established originally to commemorate the veterans of the Civil War, I believe,
> or so I recall. Ben Frank
>

Ben,
Thanx for clearing that up.  I guess I've been mistaken for all these years!
BTW, if anyone is in the area of Lexington, MA, the Museum of Our National
Heritage is having an exhibit on articles that have been left at the Vietnam
Memorial (the Wall), and it is quite moving (that's were I spent a good part
of Veteran's Day....sorry this isn't WWII, but I thought others might be
interested if they are in the area).  Once again, thanks for the info!

Steve Salina

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 12:31:50 -0600
From:    "Robert J. Granvin" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Charles A Lindberg

> > If I remember correctly, Lindberg went to Germany in the late 30's
> > at the invitation of Goering and came home "praising" the Luftwaffe
> > and indicating that we didn't have a chance against them.  He then
> > got involved with the America First movement which fought FDR on
> > Lend-Lease, our involvement in the European War, etc.  As a result,
> > FDR did not like Lindberg and when Charles tried to get into the US
> > military after Pearl Harbor, his commission was blocked on FDR's
> > orders.  The only way he got into the war was as a rep for United
> > Aircraft.
>
>   I heard it this way.  He was invited by Goring, and Joseph Kennedy
> encouraged him to go to collect information on the German air power.
> He was so impressed with it that he felt that Germany would win any
> air war and further Kennedy's isolationism.  He was presented with a
> medal, but he was not aware that the Germans would present it.  This
> meant that he did not know what to do and accepted it because he didn't
> want to offend the Germans.
>   I read this account in John Weis' *Hitler's Diplomat*, a biography
> of Ribbentrop.

Ironically, one of the advantages of never having read/heard/debated
much about a topic can make some appearances seem clear.

Lindbergh has been called everything from a fool, to a traitor to just
grossly mistaken depending on who is doing the talking.

But when you consider the time period, it's very easy to come to a
conclusion that there may very well never have been any conspiracies or
back-room-negotiating that we all love and hold so dear. :-)

In the late 1930's, very few people would have been able to come back from
a tour of the German military complex and admit, with a straight face, that
the United States held a glimmer of a chance.  The U.S. was not doing a
great job building it's air power while Germany was focusing heavily on it.
I don't have the numbers handy, but the number of _combat_ ready aircraft
the U.S. could put in the air worldwide on December 7, 1941 was appallingly
low.  The U.S., while building a military machine, was doing it slowly and
cautiously until there was no more choice.  Germany was going full-bore.

Knowing the U.S. military machine as well as he did and comparing it to the
German machine he just saw, I see no reason to believe why he would not have
felt that Germany was definitely a superior power, at least in the air.

Opposition to Lend Lease and other activities is not difficult to
understand either.  The popular philosophy of the time was isolationism,
neutrality and work-like-hell to stay out of war.  Many (many!) people saw
Lend Lease as a threat to that neutrality and opposed it.

When talking about the gross images, Lindbergh proclaiming that we had no
chance against the Germans while opposing Lend Lease was not only popular,
but perhaps even logical.  Of course, as one of the outspoken opponents,
he suffered criticism and even retribution when the U.S. was finally dragged
into the war and there was no choice anymore.

This isn't to say that none of the accusations made weren't or couldn't be
true, only that when you compare the popular beliefs and desires of the
time along with the facts and reality of the time, Lindbergh's reaction is
not a difficult one to expect.  If those issues are removed from the
equations, many or most of the theories tend to fall apart.

--
\\ Robert J. Granvin                                 User Services Specialist
// School of Statistics - University of Minnesota            [email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 13:34:14 EDT
From:    "Steve L. New" <[email-masked]>
Subject: WEAP: P-38 in the Pacific (Part 6)

Wings Magazine
4 August 1978

"The P-38 Lightning in the Pacific, the Aleutians, China-Burma-India

By,
Warren M. Bodie

SANTA WAS GOOD TO SAMMY

Through some strange quirks of fate, problems involving travel and,
primarily, a terrific competitive spirit, most of the top-scoring
aces in the air forces of the Pacific Theater of Operations failed
to survive the war years. One or two of the high scoring survivors
of  those combat years who are well qualified to provide detailed
accounts of the action are known to be extremely reclusive. One
largely unknown Pacific ace - who might have become very well known
except for a few twists of fate and the severity of tropical
conditions - proved to be a most elusive object of a concerted
search effort, but when the pursuit ended, that pilot provided one
of the most detailed accounts of his personal combat activities
that we have encountered to date.

The pilot to whom we refer is Major Sammy Pierce. a long-time member
of the famed 49th Fighter Group's 8th Fighter Squadron.  Major Pierce
concluded his two combat tours with seven confirmed victories and
five probables. In circumstances not unlike those of a number of his
fellow pilots, all of the "probables" were more than likely, really
valid victories. Why couldn't they be confirmed?

First of all, gun camera film reaching the subtropical combat
zones in 1943 and even in 1944 was frequently impossible to
interpret after exposure because of the effects of moisture (water
spotting, fungus). That meant that either two fellow pilots had to
confirm your victory, or surface-based personnel had to do it. That
latter situation was subject to locating the people and having them
confirm which aircraft was involved - a nearly impossible task. An
outstanding example involved Sammy Pierce's air-to-air combat in a
P-40E on October 13, 1943. Off the coast of New Guinea.  near New
Britain at dusk, with only PT boat crews as surface observers (while
under attack), Pierce shot down two Aichi Val dive bombers and a
Kawasaki Tony. The Navy crews reported no less than 17 separate
"splashes" in the fading light, none of which could be counted as a
confirmed victory for anyone. Pierce's camera film was impossible to
decipher, so he was limited to claiming three probables. However, we
are primarily concerned with the P-38, so the specific encounter with
which this story is concerned hinges on Sammy Pierce's second tour of
duty with the 8th Fighter Squadron. The outfit could boast of having
had some of the best fighter jockies.  including Bong, McGuire, Gerry
Johnson, Jordan "Duckbutt" Watson, DeHaven and Aschenbrener. As a
matter of record, both Pierce and Aschenbrener were taking rest and
relaxation in the USA when they received an urgent request to return
to the group because of a critical shortage of experienced pilots in
the Philippines. Pierce had been with the 8th from late 1942 until
May, 1944, flying P-40Es, P-40Fs, P-40Ks and P-40N-15-CUs. (In his
earlier days with the Air Corps, he had logged time in P-36s, P-40Bs,
P-43s, P-39Ds, Fs and Qs, plus some time in Allison-powered P-51s. He
describes the P-39D as "a flying electrical system looking for a
place to go haywire.")

Sammy Pierce and Robert Aschenbrener rejoined the 49th Group at
Tacloban on Leyte Island just after the group moved into that new
base. They may have been "experienced" fighter pilots, but Pierce -
for one - had not spent as much as 5 minutes even sitting in any P-38
type since his Army career began. To make matters somewhat more
interesting, the 8th Squadron had received tired P-38J-15-LOs that
had been thoroughly flogged by their former owners, the 8th Fighter
Group and the 35th Fighter Group.  (The latter groups had received
new P-38L-1-LOs at Biak Island just before the invasion of the
Philippines had gotten under way.) Pierce said that the initial 45
days in combat were absolute murder for the maintenance crews.  Those
P-38Js were relatively old and terribly war weary from battling the
Japanese, long missions, bad weather and tropical rot in New Guinea.
Replacement parts were nearly nonexistent, and to make matters
worse. it rained constantly. Enemy cooperation was lacking too, for
the Japanese gleefully strafed and bombed the airfield at every
opportunity although most crews did not leave the flight line for
days and nights on end, it was rarely possible for the squadron to
field twelve operational fighters at a time.  Some of the younger
replacement pilots remained firm in the belief that you could not
bail out of a Lightning without fatal results, more than two full
years after Lt. Harry C. Crim, Jr., (now, Col., USAF, Ret.) had done
it at Paine Field. First and 14th Fighter Group pilots had been the
first to discover that it wasn't all that difficult even under the most
severe combat conditions, sometimes at absurdly low altitudes in
North Africa. The new replacements were so poorly indoctrinated
in certain aspects of P-38 operation that they were unanimous in
their opinion that the airplane would not glide. Pierce had an en-
tirely different opinion.

"Basically, it was probably one of the easiest aircraft in the world
to fly if all systems were working properly. Actually, it was a
beautiful flying thing, even with things going wrong and some
systems out."

Fortunately for Pierce, he had some twin-engine time in Lockheed
C-40s, Beech C-45s and Curtiss AT-9 Jeeps when he was introduced to
the P-38J at Tacloban. His transition flight No. 1 was an air cover
flight to support a Navy operation. He was tremendously impressed
with the P-38 as a gun platform and found the J-l5 model very easy to
fly except for turbo regulation.

Major Pierce's most memorable mission in a Lightning was flown on
December 25, 1944, when the squadron flew cover for a number of
B-24s dispatched to bomb Clark Field on Luzon. On that particular
mission he was credited with four confirmed victories and one
probable - all against Japanese fighter types.

In relating that tale Major Pierce provided us with graphic
detail that we feel deserves to be published without alteration.
Therefore, in a departure from normal style, his story is presented
just as it was related to the author.  One of the fighters he
nailed that day turned out to be among the first Nakajima, Ki.84-1a
Frank single-seat fighters encountered in the Pacific.

"Our squadron was the rear (tail end) sguadron in the entire group
(the 49th) flying mid-level cover at 20,000 feet. The 8th Fighter
Group was flying top cover above a thin overcast, and the 475th Group
was flying close support just above and off to one side of the '24s.
Our group only had eleven P-38s operational at takeoff, enough to
make up a couple of 4-ship flights and one 3-ship flight that I was
to lead at the back of the bunch. One plane in the second flight
aborted on takeoff and my No. 3 man dropped out shortly thereafter.
My wingman stayed with me as I pulled up to form a rather loose
second element of the second flight.

As the B-24s approached the IP (Initial Point). the boys from
the 8th Fighter Group started to call in Bogies (e/a). As the Libs
turned off from the IP, I spotted several flights of enemy fighters
- three to five planes in each flight - breaking out of the overcast
at about 10 o'clock position. I called the Bogies into the 49th's
lead flight and went through my tank jettison and switching
procedures. Evidently the lead flight hadn't heard my warning call,
so they were turning away from the attacking flights of Japs.
Something had to be done, so I pushed on full power and zoomed up
directly into the middle of the Jap flights. There just wasn't any
other alternative.

As the enemy flight leader reached my altitude, he flattened his
dive to meet me head on. We closed to firing range and I was
surprised to see his nose drop and thought it rather odd to observe
some flashes over the top of his canopy. Of course I fired about the
same time and my first burst struck between the cowling and the
windshield near the left wing root. Pieces started to flake off his
airplane, followed by smoke as we closed to pass. I pulled up to go
over him and he exploded at that moment. I swung into a maximum power
climbing turn to gain an altitude advantage and try to pick up my
wingman. When I couldn't locate him, I assumed that one of the
attackers had hit him as we passed through them.  During my search, I
saw the other two flights from the 475th with two enemy flights in
pursuit. Using my altitude advantage, I dove after the enemy while
trying to call our flights to warn them, without success.

By the time I came within range of the e/a, the leader was firing at
the No. 3 man in the second flight of P-38s. (I couldn't help but
wonder why nobody in the two flights was being alert to attacks from
the rear and above, and I was frustrated because my shouted warning
could not penetrate the chatter filling the air.) Just as I lined up
in firing position, smoke puffed from the left engine of the No. 3
man's aircraft. He skidded left and rolled, so I assumed he had been
hit. The attacking Jap aircraft was a type totally unfamiliar to me.
As I started to fire, the pilot realized that I was behind him; he
rolled to start a split-S, but that merely exposed his belly. My
fire was accurate and hits were seen all across the midsection. The
aircraft blew up.

While trying to locate that smoking No. 3 man,I pulled around, only
to see eight e/a in two flights firing at the B-24s. The three plane
flight was intercepted by a flight of P-38s from the 475th FG, and
the leader nailed two e/a on one pass as the third Jap broke away. I
was in position to hit the five plane Japanese flight from the rear,
and one plane burst into flames. The other four broke off their
attack on the formation just as a Jap fighter appeared in my mirror,
so I nosed down and applied full power to gain speed. It was then
that I saw that my left oil temperature was well into the red and
the coolant temp was right at the maximum. My good luck held because
a flight from the 80th Fighter Squadron met me head on and the Jap
chasing me broke off his pursuit as they charged at him. I set
the manual switches for the oil and coolant shutters to full open
position on the left engine. Almost immediately the temperatures
started to move down, but I did have some trim problems to contend
with.

My eyes focused on a lone Jap fighter below me at the 11 o'clock
position and on my same heading. I made a normal "curve of pursuit"
pass on him but goofed it up and wound up practically flying
formation with him. He was sitting there staring straight ahead, so I
slid out, pulled up and made another pass that I botched by
overshooting. Expecting him to break rather abruptly, I pulled my
nose slightly to the left and fired a second short burst. Slugs
appeared to hit him between his cockpit and the tail section with
no positive results. He reached a cloud bank and I fully expected
him to dive down into it and get away. Instead, he remained only
far enough into it that I could trace his shadowy image. Suddenly he
pulled up directly in front of me, so I fired a burst that was
really just a reaction to his sudden move. Parts began to fly from
the aircraft, it belched a lot of smoke and snap rolled back into
the clouds. I didn't see any sign of him after that.

Looking for a "friendly," I pulled up and observed several P-38s
chasing a single Jap fighter, but in their enthusiasm and
over eagerness, they were all overrunning or overshooting him. When
it looked like he might escape their attack by getting into the
clouds, I cut power, rolled into a normal firing pass and fired a
fairly long burst that caused him to start smoking and the plane
began to break up. When I joined up with the flight that was chasing
him, the leader turned out to be none other than Major Tom McGuire of
the 475th Group - one of the ex-members of our own 49th FG.

We all cruised around, collecting most of the stray "friendlies" and
then headed for home. My fuel was going at a pretty rapid rate
because I was using extra power to compensate for the wide open
cooler doors and oil cooler flaps. Low fuel reserves forced us to
put down at the recently built San Jose Strip on Mindoro.

My landing was OK until the nose wheel hit. The gear collapsed.
My main gear held up, so I cut the switches and skidded to a bumpy
stop.

Post-flight inspection indicated that when that first enemy
aircraft exploded directly under me,'skin panels from the fighter
had lodged in my cooler scoops. Although I lost that airplane I
wasn't bent too far out of shape because I got a brand new (one of
the first) P-38L-5-LO that arrived just a few days later at our
base at Tacloban. My confirmed score for that day - December 25,
1944 - was four definites and one probable. All were confirmed on
the basis of witnesses or camera film, and every one of the
aircraft was a fighter. The first of the e/as was a late-model Zeke
that had a 20mm cannon mounted in the aft fuselage and firing at an
angle over the cockpit enclosure. The second victory was the Frank
fighter that was totally unknown to us (in the 49th) prior to that
mission."

Major Pierce's combat episode can be viewed as only slightly
atypical of numerous air-to-air combat events that involved P-38s
in the Pacific Theater of Operations in the last year or so of the
war. He was having an exceptionally good day, it's true, because
his old P-38J didn't let him down, his gunnery was 4.0, and he
managed to get some very good breaks.  But many other pilots had days
that were nearly as successful, and some of those pilots had it
happen more than one or two times.  Until the advent of the P-51D in
large numbers in 1945, there simply was no other AAF or Allied
fighter in the area that was capable of performing in such an
exceptional manner.

History could have been much kinder to the Lightning, had it not
been so distorted by repetitious reporting of stories that were
really without substance. Even Gen. James Dolittle was poorly
apprised of the performance of the P-38s in Gen. Kenney's and in
Gen. Eaker's commands, mainly because the problems of his own
air forces consumed most of his waking hours. But the plain
evidence that has been ignored for so many years has now been
presented, so we hope to see an end to the blatantly distorted
stories of the past. The Lockheed P-38 Lightning was one helluva
fighting/flying machine, just as Ben Kelsey said it was on the day
he flew the very first one.

Steve New

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 14:39:27 CCS
From:    Jorge Merino <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: WEAP:  CV-8 USS Hornet

Cassady,

> I have always thought of the Hornet, Yorktown and Enterprise as in the
> same class.

Maybe this is a similar case as with the modern Kitty Hawk carriers.
Most sources consider all four carriers as Kitty Hawks (CV-63 Kitty Hawk,
CV-64 Constellation, CV-66 America and CV-67 John F. Kennedy), while
some others (including the Navy itself, I think), consider the JFK as
a single ship class. I guess this is because JFK was laid down as a
nuclear powered carrier, but was finished as a conventional carrier,
like the Kitty Hawks. She is quite longer than the other Kitty Hawks,
and has some external differences too.

A similar situation occured with Essex class carriers in WWII. There
were two sub-classes of Essex carriers: The original short hull Essex
(872 feet), and the long hull Essex (888 feet). The long hull carriers
were sometimes mentioned as Ticonderoga class (CV-14 Ticonderoga was
the first long hull Essex class carrier).

> Wasp was a single ship class, maybe even closer to Ranger in
> size, but quite better in capability.

Closer to Ranger in size, but similar to Yorktown in shape, I think.
I don't have the specs of Ranger, but I think she mas much smaller.
About Wasp, what I understand is that she was a reduced Yorktown
version, because of the Washington Treaty limitations (the maximun
tonnage was about to be reached, and a normal Yorktown would have
surpassed it largerly). This is why Wasp is considered a single class.
I don't have her specs, but it would be interesting to compare her
with the other Yorktown carriers.

Jorge Merino

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 13:15:32 GMT-6
From:    "Robert T. Moore" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Dieppe Raid in 1942

Hello, Anwar!

> I am coaching some high school students on a debate "Be it resolved that
> Churchill's decision on Dieppe Raid was sound". Are there any opinions
> or views on this topic?

    The Dieppe Raid was never intended to acquire a lodgement on the
Continent. There were two reasons for carrying out this raid:

    1) to develop the techniques and the technology to carry out
"Overlord".

    2) to secure a copy or an example of the "Wurzburg" radar
apparatus which was located nearby.

    Hope this helps.

    Terry

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 14:21:02 -0500
From:    "Steven Pudlo, Dept. Computer Svcs." <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: REMEMBERANCES ON V

Stevev Salina writes;

>BTW, if anyone is in the area of Lexington, MA, the Museum of Our National
>Heritage is having an exhibit on articles that have been left at the Vietnam
>Memorial (the Wall), and it is quite moving (that's were I spent a good part
>of Veteran's Day....sorry this isn't WWII, but I thought others might be
>interested if they are in the area).  Once again, thanks for the info!

Are you referring to the Scottish Rite museum? I plan to go there during
the Thanxgiving break as I have in-laws in the vacinity. I will surely check
this out!
                                                                Steve

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Steven E. Pudlo  - [email-masked] |"Life may be a drag...
STC Programmer/Analyst - (203) 885-2343  |    But it sure beats the
Three Rivers Community-Technical College |       only known alternative"
574 New London Turnpike                  |                     (S.E.P.)
Norwich, CT. U.S.A. 06360                |No one gets out of it alive..
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 14:50:33 -0500
From:    Barone <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: help

        Sorry for the delay in responding.  Our Internet gateway has been
crashing intermittently and the email that had't fallen on the floor had
piled up like cords of wood and I've only recently caught up with all my
email reading!

> I was disconnected from this mailing list, what's happened.

        I had to remove you from the list on October 12 because your
mailbox on AOL was full and I was receiving many bounced messages.  Of
course, since your mailbox was full, I had no way of contacting you to
ask you to clean out your mailbox!  Since the problem didn't clear up
after a day or so, I had to remove you from the list to retain my sanity!
Sorry for any inconvenience, but you will have to resubscribe.

                Joe Barone
                [email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 14:54:48 EST
From:    Doug McCabe <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: PRESERVING DOCUMENTS

                   Ohio University Electronic Communication

   Date:  15-Nov-1994 02:44pm EST

     To:  Remote Addressee                     ( _MX%"[email-masked]" )

   From:  Doug McCabe                                Dept:  Library
          MCCABE                                   Tel No:  (614) 593-2715

Subject:  Re: PRESERVING DOCUMENTS

         John Ausland's suggestion that original documents be turned over
    to professionals in repositories is excellent and I wish I had said it
    in my earlier post.
         What I think is the most important reason for doing so is that the
    documents become available to many, many people who will appreciate
    them.  Repositories are also responsible for the preservation and care
    of the materials and their employees are trained to see to that care.
    While families might appreciate the originals, they cannot give the
    same care and devotion as a repository.  John's plan to save the copies
    for the family and give the originals to a repository is the best
    solution.
         I guess another way to say it is Ken Burns ("The Civil War") and
    all of us are much the richer because of all those letters and such
    preserved where they're accessible.  So, as a plea from an archivist:
    please give (we're all poor) your original stuff to a place which will
    care and share it.

    Doug McCabe
    Archives and Special Collections
    Ohio University

Received:  15-Nov-1994 02:54pm

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 15:00:20 EST
From:    Kurt Luginbyhl <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: REMEMBERANCES ON V

Just so that little time is wasted in further debate: "VETERANS DAY, a
holiday proclaimed annually by the President of the United States and by
the state governors in honor of former members of the US armed forces,
to recall their sacrifices in war and contributions in peace. Formerly
know as Armistice Day." Armistice Day was observed from 1919 to 1953.
"In June of 1954 Pres. D.D. Eisenhower signed an act of Congress...to
honor veterans... ...a day dedicated to world peace."

MEMORIAL DAY was first observed in Waterloo N.Y. on May 5, 1866.
Congress has recognized Waterloo as the birthplace of Memorial Day. In
1868 Gen. John Logan Grand Army of the Republic declared that May 30th
would be a day "to decorate with flowers the graves of comrades who died
in defense of their country during the late rebellion." After WWI the
day was set aside to honor all war dead. The last Monday in May became a
federal holiday in 1971.

Some Southern states observe Confederate Memorial Day-April 26 in
Georgia, the last Monday in April in Ala. and Miss. and May 10th in SC.
Confederate Memorial day is observed on the last Monday in May in the
Commonwealth of Virginia, although I don't remember ever hearing about
it when I was younger.

This info was taken from the Encyclopedia Americana 1991.  So don't
blame me if this is all wrong.   :)

H. A. Kurt Luginbyhl
Scientific Computing                      202-357-1955 Office
National Museum of Natural History        202-357-1955_Fax
Washington D.C. 20560                   "Rast Ich, So Rost Ich"

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 15:14:26 -0400
From:    "Steven C. Salina" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: REMEMBERANCES ON V

> Steve Salina writes;
>
> >BTW, if anyone is in the area of Lexington, MA, the Museum of Our National
> >Heritage is having an exhibit on articles that have been left at the Vietnam
> >Memorial (the Wall), and it is quite moving (that's were I spent a good part
> >of Veteran's Day....sorry this isn't WWII, but I thought others might be
> >interested if they are in the area).  Once again, thanks for the info!
>
> Are you referring to the Scottish Rite museum? I plan to go there during
> the Thanxgiving break as I have in-laws in the vacinity. I will surely check
> this out!
>                                                                 Steve
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> Steven E. Pudlo  - [email-masked] |"Life may be a drag...
> STC Programmer/Analyst - (203) 885-2343  |    But it sure beats the
> Three Rivers Community-Technical College |       only known alternative"
> 574 New London Turnpike                  |                     (S.E.P.)
> Norwich, CT. U.S.A. 06360                |No one gets out of it alive..
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
>

Steve,
Those would both be one and the same.  Enjoy the exhibit!

Steve

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 12:20:36 -0800
From:    John Davis <[email-masked]>
Subject: INF: Byrd Archives

Has anyone else had trouble getting into the Byrd archives lately? For
several days now, I haven't been able to get in. I've tried from several
different accounts and hosts and also FTP and WWW. No luck at all.
Usually get a message - connection refused. Is it just busy or is
something wrong?

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
John Davis     [email-masked]
Cary, N.C.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 14:46:19 GMT-6
From:    "Robert T. Moore" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: GEN: Renegade Officers in WW2

Hello, Peter!

Couldn't resist offering a comment here, and thanks for the post.

> refused once again.  Steiner's attack was never launched and no effective
> action was taken against him, at least by Hitler.

    At that stage of the war, there wasn't much any one, let alone
Hitler, could do to stop the inevitable.

    As long as you are looking or considering "renegades", please
consider the "outright" disobedience of Speer to Hitler's draconian
order to destroy what was tantamount to the entire country with his
version of "scorched earth".

    Anyway, thanks again for the post and allowing my comment to your
post.

    All the best.

    Terry

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 13:48:02 -0700
From:    RUTZEN GREG <[email-masked]>
Subject: 99th Inf. Div. Reunion

My grandfather died while serving with the 394th Inf. Reg., 99th Div. in
March of 1945.  Does anyone know of any reunion-type activities that the
99th Div. may be having to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Bulge,
or any get-togethers at all?  I know very little about my grandfather,
and I would very much like to meet some of his fellow "Checkerboarders".
Thanks much.

Greg Rutzen
[email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 16:14:04 -0500
From:    Ron Babuka <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: REMEMBERANCES ON V

>
>MEMORIAL DAY was first observed in Waterloo N.Y. on May 5, 1866.
>Congress has recognized Waterloo as the birthplace of Memorial Day. In
>1868 Gen. John Logan Grand Army of the Republic declared that May 30th
>would be a day "to decorate with flowers the graves of comrades who died
>in defense of their country during the late rebellion." After WWI the
>day was set aside to honor all war dead. The last Monday in May became a
>federal holiday in 1971.
>

As a side note, the town of Seneca Falls is located another 20 or so
minutes from Waterloo.  Seneca Falls is the "home" of the woman's sufferage
movement.  It is intresting to notice that the birthplace of the day set
aside to honor  the men and women that made the ultimate sacifice to
protect American and human rights, is located only 20 minutes from the
sight of the movement to first promote womens rights in America.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ron Babuka
Cornell University
CIT - Information Resources
Ithaca, New York 14850
(607) 254-6492

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 16:08:29 -0500
From:    David Rising <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: 50TH: BATTLE OF THE HUERTGEN FOREST

Just thought those living in the Boston area may want to know that the
Battle of the Bulge special is on tonight at 9:00 on "the American
Experience" on PBS. Cheers,
David Rising

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 15:12:50 -0800
From:    Julian E Gomez <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Cannibalism in other theaters

>Hello, Julian!
>
>That far north in Europe and at the time of year produces the effect
>of "White Nights", or almost constant daylight.
>
>   Hope this helps.

Thanks, Terry, but only a little. Since the sun is up for only a few hours,
what creates the light? Is it light reflected off the vast expanses of
snow?

"I was a precocious child and obviously destined to be a scientist."

        Dr. Julian "a tribble took it" Gomez
        Apple Computer, Inc.  408/862-1289 or 996-1010
        [email-masked]  [email-masked]

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 19:20:29 EDT
From:    "Steve L. New" <[email-masked]>
Subject: INF: Byrd Archives

    I haven't attempted to access Byrd this week, because of my experience
    with them last week.

    Although I could access the Byrd system through FTP, I was not able to
    access individual sub-directories.  Each attempt resulted in an error
    message stating that there was no valid subdirectory, even though my
    GUI showed that it was there.

    I suspect one of two possibilities:

     Best Case, Byrd is re-organizing their files, and will be down until
    they're finished. (Not hard to accept from a bureaucracy.)

    Worst Case,  Byrd is having big time problems.

    I have no idea who to contact to find out, though.

    Steve New

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 20:42:00 EST
From:    mc killop <[email-masked]>
Subject: [INF] USAAF 16 NOV 44

COMBAT CHRONOLOGY OF THE US ARMY AIR FORCES
THURSDAY, 16 NOVEMBER 1944
FTP SITES
  1. ftp.rutgers.edu in directory pub/wwii/usaf
  2. byrd.mu.wvnet.edu (129.71.32.152) in pub/history/military/airforce/
     wwii_chronology

AIRCRAFT MENTIONED IN THIS REPORT:
  A-20, Douglas Havoc
  B-17, Boeing Flying Fortress
  B-24, Consolidated Liberator
  B-25, North American Mitchell
  P-38, Lockheed Lightning
  P-40, Curtiss
  P-47, Republic Thunderbolt
  P-51, North American Mustang

NOTE: A number in parenthesis after a target name indicates the number of
bombers attacking.

CHINA-BURMA-INDIA THEATER

  CHINA THEATER (Fourteenth Air Force): In China, 23 B-24s bomb Changsha; 8
B-25s hit Lohochai and bomb the Wanling, Burma area. In French Indochina, 16
B-25s hit Nghia Trang, Duc Tho, Nha Trang, and Do Len. 70+ P-40s and P-51s
over SE and SW China on armed reconnaissance attack road, river, and rail
traffic, town areas, and other targets of opportunity at several scattered
locations.

  INDIA-BURMA THEATER (Tenth Air Force): In Burma, 30 P-47s hit troop
concentrations and supply areas at Naungmo, Nawngmoloi, and Lashio; 11
support ground forces in the Pinwe area, 4 attack bridges at Meza and over
the Sindaw River; 4 bomb the Meza railroad station, 16 sweep the railroad
from Sagaing to Kanbalu, and 16 strafe Nawnghkioand Hsumhsai Airfields.
Transports fly 270+ sorties to forward bases and frontline areas.

EUROPEAN THEATER OF OPERATIONS (ETO)

  STRATEGIC OPERATIONS (Eighth Air Force): Mission 715: 1,243 bombers and 282
fighters, along with Ninth AF and Royal Air Force (RAF) aircraft, are
dispatched to attack tactical targets E of Aachen, Germany in support of the
US First and Ninth Armies' offensive; 1 fighter is lost:
  1. 486 of 495 B-17s hit transportation targets in the Duren area; 1 B-17 is
damaged beyond repair and 8 damaged; 1 airman is WIA. Escort is 151 of 159
P-51s; 1 is damaged beyond repair.
  2. 490 of 501 B-17s and 228 of 243 B-24s hit transportation targets in the
Eschweiler area; 2 B-17s are damaged beyond repair and 8 damaged; 2 airmen
are KIA, 2 WIA and 6 MIA. Escort is 98 of 107 P-51s; 1 is lost (pilot MIA)
and 3 damaged beyond repair.
  4 of 4 B-17s fly a screening force mission.
  16 of 16 P-51s fly a scouting force mission.

  TACTICAL OPERATIONS (Ninth Air Force): In Germany, 80 9th Bombardment
Division bombers hit defended areas and strongpoints at Echtz, Luchem, and
Eschweiler; IX Tactical Air Command fighter-bombers dive-bomb gun positions
and other targets in the Stolberg and Hurtgen areas and XIX Tactical Air
Command supports the US XX Corps in the Merzig, Trier, and Saarbrucken area;
the XXIX Tactical Air Command attacks targets in 12 W German towns; the US
First and Ninth Armies begin an eastward thrust (Operation QUEEN) into hit by
the IX and XXIX Tactical Air Commands.

MEDITERRANEAN THEATER OF OPERATIONS (MTO)

  STRATEGIC OPERATIONS (Fifteenth Air Force): 550+ B-17s and B-24s attack
Munich, Germany W marshalling yard and troop concentrations at Visegrad,
Yugoslavia as well as an alternate target of Innsbruck, Austria marshalling
yard and scattered targets of opportunity; 250+ P-51s and P-38s support the
attack on Munich; 26 other P-38s strafe transport targets on roads between
Sarajevo and Novi Pazar, Yugoslavia.

  TACTICAL OPERATIONS (Twelfth Air Force): In Italy, medium bombers fly 250+
sorties against rail lines in the Brenner Pass and other parts of NE Italy
destroying the railroad bridge at Sacile; fighter-bombers in support of the
British Eighth Army advance to the NW of Forli, hit guns, ammunition
supplies, and other military targets, attack pipeline crossings of the Po
River at Ostiglia and Ferrara, and pontoon stores near Ficarola, as well as
hitting communications targets N of the battle area; the 346th Fighter
Squadron, 350th Fighter Group, moves from Tarquinia to Pisa with P-47s.

PACIFIC OCEAN AREA (POA)

  AAFPOA (Seventh Air Force): 12 Saipan Island-based B-24s bomb shipping at
Chichi Jima Island while 2 others attack barges at Haha Jima. 12 P-47s and 3
P-38s hit the airfield on Pagan Island in the first combat strike by P-38s in
the Mariana Islands.  During the night of 16/17 Nov a snooper mission in the
Bonin Islands, a B-24 attacks shipping.

SOUTHWEST PACIFIC AREA [SWPA, Far East Air Force (FEAF)]: Colonel Willard R
Wolfinbarger becomes Commanding Officer of the XIII Fighter Command.
  In the C Philippine Islands and in the Mindanao Island area B-25s, B-24s,
and fighter-bombers hit airfields, harbors, shipping, and targets of
opportunity.  In the Kendari area and on the NE peninsula of Celebes Island,
and on Halmahera Island, B-24s, B-25s, and fighter-bombers pound airfields,
villages and shipping. B-25s also support ground forces in the Mapia Island
and bomb Namlea Airfield on Buru Island. Units moving to Leyte Island,
Philippine Islands: HQ 3d Bombardment Group (Light) and 90th Bombardment
Squadron (Light) from Hollandia, New Guinea with A-20s; HQ 348th Fighter
Group from Noemfoor Island.

SOURCES:
AIR FORCE COMBAT UNITS OF WORLD WAR II, Office of Air Force History,
  Headquarters USAF, 1961, ISBN 0-912799-02-1
COMBAT SQUADRONS OF THE AIR FORCE, WORLD WAR II, Office of Air Force
  History, Headquarters USAF 1982
THE ARMY AIR FORCES IN WORLD WAR II: COMBAT CHRONOLOGY, 1941-1945 by the
  Office of Air Force History, Headquarters USAF, 1973
THE MIGHTY EIGHTH WAR DIARY by Roger A. Freeman, ISBN 1-85409-071-2

Jack McKillop
USAF (Airways and Air Communications Service)
1955-59

-------------------------------------------------------------------
|  Jack McKillop         |  Those who have long enjoyed such      |
|  Bellcore              |  privileges as we enjoy forget in      |
|  Piscataway, NJ USA    |  time that men have died to win them.  |
|  [email-masked]  |                       FDR              |
-------------------------------------------------------------------

16/0142Z NOV

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 22:01:52 -0500
From:    chris garcia <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: GEN: Renegade Officers in WW2

Have you heard of the "fighter pilots rebellion" in theLuftwaffe in the
last year of the war?  If not you may read of it in detail in the
autobiograhy of Adolf Galland called "The FirstandThe Last" and the war
memoirs of Johannes Steinhoff called "The Final Hours; A German Jet pilot
Plots Against Goering". As the war began to deteriorate for the
Luftwaffe, Hitler blamed Goering for the waves of allied bombers coming
into Germany.  Goering blamed his fighter pilots, accusing them of
cowardice.  Galland thought about suicede, when his own dispair
overwhelmed him.  Finally the Lufwaffe's fighter aces began to conspire
to overthrow Goering by any means nesscessary, including assasination.  A
little group lead by Gunther Lutzow and Ritter Von Grime and Johannes
Steinhoff confronted Goering with their complaints.  He accused them of
mutiny, threatened to have them shot and put them- and galland- under a
kind of house arrest.  Finally Hitler told Goering to give Galland the
Me262 jet fighters he wanted.  Goering assigned Galland to the western
front, in 1945 this was the equivelent of a death sentence.  Galland
began phoning up all the old hands, including the mutineers.  Together
they formed the legendary Jagdverband 44, called The Mutineer Squadron.
This was the second jet fighter squadron in history, composed almost
entirely of Germany most accomplished fighter pilots, most of whom were
under house arrest for conspiring to do away with Goering.  When Germany
surrendered they were the last Jagdwaffe squadron still on it's feet
fighting.  The First and The Last.

------------------------------

Date:    Tue, 15 Nov 1994 23:46:13 -0500
From:    Ben Frank <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: HIST-THE STUDY OF

As much as I respect, revere Holland Smith, I must warn those who read his
"Coral and Brass" that it was written in anger, striking out at his perceived
and real enemies, most of whom wore the Army uniform, and this goes back to
World War I. He didn't have too much love for the Navy, either. One only has to
read about his volcanic arguments with the arrogant Richmond Kelly Turner, a
naval officer who thought he knew how to conduct amphibious landings and ground
operations better than any Marine because he was a platoon leader at the Naval
Academy. Smith had no great love for Nimitz, whom he felt did not support him
and his Marines against such SOBs, and I'm being kind and a Marine, as LtGen
Robert "Nelly" Richardson, who was Nimitz' Army deputy, and who thought that
Marines should not command units as large as a division, much less a corps. I
could go on, but I become quite angry when I remember that Nimitz did not even
have the grace to invite Holland Smith to the surrender ceremony on board the
Missouri. Ben Frank

------------------------------

End of WWII-L Digest - 14 Nov 1994 to 15 Nov 1994
*************************************************