Question: Kenneth Marlar Taylor had a friend best known for being one of the few United States Army Air Corps fighter pilots able to get airborne to engage Japanese forces in the attack on Pearl Harbor whose name was what?
Context: The United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) was the military aviation arm of the United States of America between 1926 and 1941.  After World War I, as early aviation became an increasingly important part of modern warfare, a philosophical rift developed between more traditional ground-based army personnel and those who felt that aircraft were being underutilized and that air operations were being stifled for political reasons unrelated to their effectiveness.  The USAAC was renamed from the earlier United States Army Air Service on 2 July 1926, and was part of the larger United States Army.  The Air Corps became the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) on 20 June 1941, giving it greater autonomy from the Army's middle-level command structure.  During World War II, although not an administrative echelon, the Air Corps (AC) remained as one of the combat arms of the Army until 1947, when it was legally abolished by legislation establishing the Department of the Air Force. Naval Training Center Orlando is a former United States Navy training installation located in Orlando, Florida.  It was originally established in 1940 as Orlando Army Air Base, a World War II advanced flight training base for the United States Army Air Corps, later United States Army Air Forces, that was also used earlier in the war for coastal patrols until the turnover of the coastal patrol mission to maritime patrol aircraft of the United States Navy and United States Coast Guard and civilian aircraft of the Civil Air Patrol.  Prior to 1940, the airport was used as the Orlando Municipal Airport, and served primarily commercial flights from its construction in 1929 to 1940.  When acquired by the Army Air Corps, multiple new landing strips were built to control the demand created by the many aircraft stationed at the base. Thomas Joseph Lynch (9 December 1916 – 8 March 1944) was a United States Army Air Forces lieutenant colonel and a World War II flying ace.  After joining the United States Army Air Corps in 1940, Lynch flew the Bell P-39 Airacobra with the 39th Pursuit Squadron.  After the Attack on Pearl Harbor, the squadron was deployed to Australia and then to Port Moresby in early 1942. Western Air Command was the part of the Royal Canadian Air Force's Home War Establishment responsible for air operations on the Pacific coast of Canada during the Second World War.  When Canada declared war against Germany in September 1939 the command consisted of only five squadrons.  Four of them equipped with obsolete aircraft including a bomber squadron with aircraft from the Great War and there were no fighter aircraft at all for its only fighter squadron (113 Fighter Squadron was thus disbanded).  With the Japanese threat after Pearl Harbor it grew rapidly and played a critical role in fighter and anti-submarine operations in Canadian and American waters during the Aleutian Islands Campaign.  It was there that Squadron Leader K.A. Boomer of No. 111 Squadron shot down a Rufe fighter, the RCAF's only kill in the Pacific Theatre.  On 7 July 1942 a Bristol Bolingbroke pressed home an attack on the Japanese Submarine Ro 32 the pilot F/Sgt.  P.M.G. Thomas of No. 115 Squadron RCAF then led American Destroyers to sink the damaged submarine.  By January 1943 Western Air Command had expanded to include many bomber, fighter and operational units under its control.  By the end of the war the command would involve some twenty squadrons when the last units to join were added in 1943.  These were the 163 Army Cooperation Squadron in March flying Bristol Bolingbrokes and Hawker Hurricanes, in May the 160 Bomber-Reconnaissance Squadron was added flying Cansos from Sea Island BC (before moving to Yarmouth NS in July) and the 166 Communication Squadron formed in September flying various types.  In addition to the new squadrons, new aircraft types came on line replacing the command's remaining Supermarine Stranraers and Blackburn Sharks with Canso's and the Bolingbrokes and Beauforts with the Lockheed Ventura.  Countless training missions and operational patrols bolstered the air activity over the coastal areas but there was not much action until RCAF Western Command was on the look out for General Kusaba's Fire Balloons that the Japanese called the Fūsen Bakudan Campaign.  In February and March 1945, P-40 fighter pilots from 133 Squadron, Royal Canadian Air Force operating out of RCAF Patricia Bay (Victoria, British Columbia), intercepted and destroyed two fire balloons, On 21 February, Pilot Officer E. E. Maxwell While shot down a balloon, which landed on Sumas Mountain, in Washington State.  On 10 March, Pilot Officer J. O. Patten destroyed a balloon near Saltspring Island, British Columbia.  During another interception a Canso forced down a fire balloon which was examined at the army headquarters.  Patrol activity was joined by the Operational Training Schools (OTS) operated by Number 4 Training Command of the BCATP.  They were the No. 3 OTS flying the Canso and Catalina and No. 32 OTS with Ansons, Beauforts and Swordfish at Patricia Bay.  In April, 1944 the No. 5 OTS Heavy Conversion unit stood up at Boundary Bay when 16 B-24 Liberators arrived fresh from American factories.  By the end of September 1944 RCAF 5 O.T.U. had grown to sizeable force of some 87 aircraft including 38 B-24 Liberators, 35 B-25 Mitchells, 5 Bolingbrokes, 8 P-40 Kittyhawks and a single Norseman.  With the end of the war in Europe these aircraft were joined by a number of Victory Aircraft Lancaster X bombers which were to be used to train the British Commonwealth's Very Long Range Bomber Tiger Force that would soon be sent to bomb the Japanese mainland from Okinawa.  With the unconditional surrender of Japan the RCAF's Tiger Force bomber squadrons were disbanded before they flew overseas and the total draw down of the Western Air Command was suddenly undertaken.  Within several months almost all the flying squadrons would be completely stood down. Claire Lee Chennault (September 6, 1893 – July 27, 1958) was an American military aviator best known for his leadership of the "Flying Tigers" and the Republic of China Air Force in World War II.  Chennault was a fierce advocate of "pursuit" or fighter-interceptor aircraft during the 1930s when the United States Army Air Corps was focused primarily on high-altitude bombardment.  Chennault retired from the United States Army in 1937, and went to work as an aviation adviser and trainer in China.  Starting in early 1941, Chennault commanded the 1st American Volunteer Group (nicknamed "Flying Tigers").  One mission which never came to fruition was the bombing of Japanese cities; the bombers did not arrive before Pearl Harbor.  (B-29's started bombing from China in 1944, but they were not under Chennault's command.)  He headed both the volunteer group and the uniformed U.S. Army Air Forces units that replaced it in 1942.  He feuded constantly with General Joseph Stilwell, the U.S. Army commander in China, and helped China's leader Chiang Kai-shek to convince President Roosevelt to remove Stilwell in 1944.  The China-Burma-India theater was strategically essential in order to fix many vital elements of the Imperial Japanese Army on the Chinese mainland to limit their use against Allied forces advancing towards Japan in the two Pacific campaigns. George Welch (May 10, 1918 – October 12, 1954) was a World War II flying ace, a Medal of Honor nominee, and an experimental aircraft pilot after the war.  Welch is best known for being one of the few United States Army Air Corps fighter pilots able to get airborne to engage Japanese forces in the attack on Pearl Harbor and for his work as a test pilot. The Prop and Wings (propeller and wings) is a military insignia used to identify various aviation-related units in the United States military.  The Prop and Wings originated as branch insignia of the United States Army Air Service in 1920, and remained such from 1926 to 1947 for the successor United States Army Air Corps.  Approximately 90% of all officers serving in the United States Army Air Forces were commissioned in the Air Corps and wore the insignia.  Versions of the insignia are still used by the United States Air Force and the United States Army Aviation Branch. Lee Embree (July 9, 1915 – January 24, 2008) was an American Army staff sergeant and photographer who took the first American air-to-air photographs of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941.  Embree took the pictures of the attack from on board an Army Air Corps B-17 which he happened to be flying on from California to Hawaii on December 7, 1941 as the Japanese attacked the Pacific Fleet stationed at Pearl Harbor. The North American Aviation T-6 Texan is an American single-engined advanced trainer aircraft used to train pilots of the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF), United States Navy, Royal Air Force, and other air forces of the British Commonwealth during World War II and into the 1970s.  Designed by North American Aviation, the T-6 is known by a variety of designations depending on the model and operating air force.  The United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) and USAAF designated it as the AT-6, the United States Navy the SNJ, and British Commonwealth air forces the Harvard, the name by which it is best known outside of the US.  Starting in 1948, the new United States Air Force (USAF) designated it the T-6, with the USN following in 1962.  It remains a popular warbird aircraft used for airshow demonstrations and static displays.  It has also been used many times to simulate various Japanese aircraft, including the Mitsubishi A6M Zero in movies depicting World War II in the Pacific. Kenneth Marlar Taylor (December 23, 1919 – November 25, 2006) was a new United States Army Air Corps Second Lieutenant pilot stationed at Wheeler Field during the Japanese attack on December 7, 1941.  Along with his fellow pilot and friend George Welch, he managed to get a fighter plane airborne under fire.  Taylor claimed to have shot down four Japanese dive bombers but only two were confirmed.  Taylor was injured during the incident and received several awards for his efforts, including the Distinguished Service Cross and the Purple Heart.
Answer: George Welch