The Bluffton news. [volume] (Bluffton, Ohio) 1875-current, 1945-06-28


Yunnan for Kweilin, and shortly aft
erwards Hill, Alison, Holloway and
led the fighters off. We were all
to infiltrate into Kweilin, few ships
at time, so as not to alert the
coast of eastern China.
For two weeks I had worried
about this attack. thought it would
come any day, and because of the
tension couldn't sleep. Each night
when I shut my eyes I'd wonder if
would do the right thing when the
time came. I'd picture myself iy-
ing in the lead, and see planes on
my wing going down in flames. I'd
roll my head down in bed and with
my eyes tightly closed see forma-
tions of Zeros passing in endless
review, climbing steeply, rolling
over in arrogance, with grinning
japanese faces. I'd get up every
morning at three o'clock hoping that
the word had come, yet also fearing
that it had. Today might be the
day that I made the mistake that
would lose my Group.
When ! learned that word hadn't
come, I'd spend another sleepless
night. got the doctor to give me
something to make me sleep and
had a headache the next day. !
knew my wind was up" as the
British say--but why In hell didn't
we go on and get the attack over
with
But now ! was on the way. I
could see the shark-mouths of the
P-40s all around, and the whole
thing was easy-just what had
wanted all the time. We sat down
at Kweilin at one-minute intervals
at eight o'clock. The bombers were
soon in, and the Chinese were busy
servicing the field full of ships. They
were the happiest people / had ever
seen. They'd point towards Japan
and point down with their turnbs and
say, "Bu-hao."
While they serviced the ships, we
hurried to the alert cave and were
"briefed" by the General. We had
to work fast, for we were so close to
japanese bases that we could have
been caught on the ground with our
Air Force II we hadn't been care
full. In fifty minutes we were away,
the fighters first, and then the bomb
ers. Making our assembly over the
designated point, we were off on our
greatest mission to date.
All of us were proud to be going.
But as I looked at those seven P-40's
escorting ten bombers, / could not
help feeling apologetic for that great
est country in the world that we
were representing. Oh, God, if the
day could soon come when we could
90 against this enemy with a thou
sand bombers, even a hundred
bombers!
Maybe the small fighter force that
we had made us lucky ones who
were privileged to go resolve all
the more that we would make up in
quality what we lacked in quantity.
Personally / felt like a veteran foot
ball player who has been on the
bench and has now been called into
the big game. Nearly a year be-
fore, when Hongkong had fallen to
the Japanese attacks from the ASH
attic mainland of Kowloon, / had
sworn that I would see the first
bombs hit the Crown Colony. I had
no idea then that / would lead the
fighters, that I would shoot down
Japanese fighters in the raid, that
we would be intercepted by a SUI
perior force of the enemy, but that
in less than three minutes after the
interception there would be only the
ships of the u. S. Army Air Force,
over Victoria harbor.N
Now had the familiar wind up"
feeling that precedes combat. The
palms of my hands perspired freely.
AS I wiped them on the legs of my
trousers I saw that the sweat was
like mud; it had mixed with the red
dust of Kweilin Field through which
we had taken off.
Our altitude kept increasing to TO-
900 feet, while down below at seven
teen thousand were the medium
bombers in javelin formation: two
Wees of three, and the last element
a diamond of four. We passed one
of the river junction check-points
that enabled me to compute our
ground speed. In fifty minutes /
could see the CLINT of the sun on
the Pacific Ocean. AS I saw the
bomber formation again, felt
proud of the crews of those perfectly
spaced ships. This really was like
football game: the bombers were
carrying the ball while we in the
pea-shooters ran the interference.
I imagined General Haynes, down
there in the lead bomber, grinning
as he thought of dropping a few
hundred more of his leafet souve-
Mrs to the Japs, Compliments of
the old broken-down transport pi-
lot'-along with at least sixty 500
pound bombs. Big Butch" Nor
gan, the best bombardier in the Air
Force, had probably wormed his
huge bulk through the tunnel into
the nose of Haynes bomber and
was even now intensely interested in
his pet bomb-sight.
1SoW lONAlQ even SIAlS1l iiiG 1Aestl-
ness of the Pacific. The sky had
never been so blue. The beauty of
the day and the beauty of those
weapons flying so smoothly under
US made me forget the scratching
of the oxygen mask on my SUM-
burned neck. It was a joy to look
back and see the six shark-mouths
on the other P-40's grinring at me.
Some day, I thought, Jap mothers
were going to frighten their children
by referring to them and reminding