The Bluffton news. [volume] (Bluffton, Ohio) 1875-current, 1945-03-08
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GOD is MY
a.. CO-PILOT
Col. Robert I.ScOff wAu RELEASE
Col. Robert l.Scoff ~nu Rslt

the Japs would bomb it on the field,
he had then fired Very pistol out
of the operations window: the red
Very light would be the signal for
the transport not to land but to fly
in the standby" area. The Very
light had gone nonchalantly out of
the operations window, into the
wind, had curved gracefully back
into another window, and had
burned the bloody building in FIVE
minutes. Operations was being car
ried on as usual from operations
desk, which was located in front of
the site of the former office. Bloody
shame, wasn't it?
Well, it was tragic, but I guess
it was better than a bombing. And
so my first mission ended.
Came May Day, and I began the
greatest month in my life. ! flew
every day in that long month, some
times as many as four missions a
day. BY putting in a total of 214
hours and As minutes, averaged
over seven hours a day for the
month. Most of this was in fighter
ships-my little old Kittyhawk and
I learned a lot, and we were very,
very lucky When / had come in
from my first sortie, the day oper-
ations burned down, my pal Col
Gerry Mason kidded me bit. Since
the next day started new month,
/ vowed then on the sacred relics of
my great-grandmother that during
those thirty-one days / would de-
stroy a Japanese plane if / had to
go all the way to Rangoon.
We got pretty confident, the trans
port boys and /, for / used to go
with them across Burma, and Jop-
lin and some of the other daredevils
would try to lure the Jap in to at
tack them. Jop would call over the
radio, in the clear: 'NR-o from
transport one three four-I'm lost
near Bhamo-give me bearing"
Up there, some three thousandsfeet
above them, I'd be sitting with my
fighter, just praying that my de
coy" would work and some luckless
Jap would come in for the kill. Then
I'd imagine myself diving on his
tail, my six guns blazing. But the
ruse never worked. Sometimes
think the Great Flying Boss in the
Sky was giving me little more
practice before he put me to the
supreme test.
May the fifth was one of the big
days in my life. Waving goodbye
to Gerry Mason as / TAXED out,
saw him hold his thumb up to mt
to wish me good hunting. I waved
back and was in the air on a sweep
towards central Burma. | went
straight to Myitkyina; then, seeing
nothing, swung South along the
Irrawaddy over Bhamo. Continuing
South | went right down on the Bur-
ma Road, North of Lashio, and
searched for enemy columns. North
of the airport at Lashio l saw two
groups of troops in marching order.
would have strafed them imme-
diately, but was afraid they might
be Chinese; after all, there were two
Chinese armies coming North some
where in Burma. / made as though
to ignore them and they partially
scattered to the sides of the road.
Twelve trucks in the column kept
rolling to the North.
Then I momentarily forgot about
the troops-for in the northwestern
corner of the field at Lashio was a
ship. From my altitude of $500 feet
saw at once that it was a twin
engined enemy bomber, later iden-
titled as Mitsubishi, Army 81. II
was being serviced, for there were
four gasoline drums in front of il
and a truck that had evidently un-
loaded the fuel. My gun switches
were already on, and had been since
] had seen the troop column. Now
I was diving for the grounded bomb
er and getting my Christmas Tree"
sight lighted properly.
Hurriedly began to shoot. I saw
men running from the truck and
| jumping into the bushes to the side.
My first shots hit in front of the
plane, probably striking the fuel
drums, for heavy dust covered the
enemy ship. I released my trigger
as pulled out of my dive, just