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Air Commandos Against Japan: Allied Special Operations in World War II Burma
In 1943 the U.S. Army Air Forces created what would become the Air Commandos, a unit that marked a milestone in tactical operations in support of British ground forces invading Burma. William T. Y'Blood tells the story of how these daring American aviators trained and went into combat using unconventional hit-and-run tactics to confuse the enemy and destroy their lines of communication and supply. The force comprised light planes to evacuate wounded, transports to move heavy cargo, fighters, bombers, gliders, helicopters, and more than five hundred men. The book describes how this top secret force successfully attacked the enemy from the air, resupplied British commandos on the ground, and airlifted the wounded out of the battle area--eventually driving the Japanese out of Burma.
- GenresWorld War IIAviation
352 pages, Hardcover
First published October 1, 2008
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July 5, 2010
The CBI (China Burma India) Theater is often overlooked as a sideshow. If the CBI Theater is a sideshow then the Air Commandos seem something out of Terry and the Pirates. Interesting enough one of the first commanding officers was the inspiration for a character in Terry and the Pirates. Y'Blood does a great job in keeping the reader interested and describing the combat as well as the political machinations behind the formation of the Air Commandos.
April 19, 2015
Air Commandos Against Japan: Allied Special Operations in World War II Burma, William T. Y'Blood, Naval Institute Press
The older I get, the more interested I have become in the less common or irregular operations of World War II.
I first became aware of the Air Commandos from a National Geographic article that released public information about Operation Thursday... the dropping of British troops by gliders well behind Japanese lines in Burma. The very notion just fires the imagination.
The author of this book also share this passion and spent years researching a story that had not been fully brought to light of these unusual forces, the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Air Commando.
The concept was borne out of tragedy. While Orde Wingate had successfully inserted British troops behind Japanese lines in earlier operations, their support had been minimal. Supplies and air cover were inadequate, and wounded men were left behind in the jungles for lack of any way to evacuate them.
Forward thinking USAAF officers proposed a unique solution: an air task force consisting of transport, gliders, liaison, fighter and light bomber aircraft dedicated to such missions. Thus was borne the Air Commando.
At first the British were skeptical that the Americans could provide the aircraft, let alone the support operations. But commitments were made coming from Hap Arnold himself, and the project proceeded.
There are many things to be learned from this book:
The hazards of flying over miles of jungle in an undeveloped country cannot be over stated. Because of shifting loyalties, pilots and crews who went down in this environment could not be sure if the local populace would safeguard them or turn them in. Some aircraft disappeared never to be seen again.
Weather was unpredictable and hazardous.
To my surprise, techniques were developed where gliders could be recovered and returned to the air immediately after use. This made them useful in a form of shuttle system. This was a precursor of the helicopter warfare of Vietnam.
Helicopters were pioneered for rescue operations in Burma. The men who flew these were truly brave, and not 100% sure of how reliable they would be operating in the environment.
While smaller in scale than the large cargo drops, the liaison aircraft proved vital. Landing in ridiculously short strips, or even river sandbars, they provided an evacuation capability that infinitely raised the morale of the troops on the ground. The 1st Air Commando Group also pioneered the use of below the wing supply bundles for supplying remote patrols, and provided a communications link in some of the remotest areas of the world.
Some of the flying that is described in this book is incredible. For example, late in the war the L5 liaison aircraft of the 3rd Air Commando flew over the open ocean from the Philippines to Okinawa for 7 hours, escorted by a Catalina and a couple of fighters. Even with extra fuel loaded, gas tanks were running dry by the time they arrived. All it would have taken would have been one ocean storm to have turned this into a disaster.
One entity that does not come off very well in this account is the Imperial Japanese Army Air Force. Later in the book, when fighter operations became more prevalent, there are very few mentions of actual dogfights. Most of the air encounters were very brief, and many of the JAAF aircraft were destroyed on the ground. As noted in the book, as the war went on, Japan pulled most of its air assets back to more vital theaters such as the Philippines and the home islands.
The best parts of the book were the descriptions of the operations.
The least interesting, but arguably necessary portions were the seemingly endless wrangling over organization and reporting structures.
It will be very clear to the reader after the first two chapters that the command relationships in the China Burma India theater were hopelessly muddled and the subject of constant revision. If that were not enough, the debates extended about to whom the Air Commandos reported to, who controlled their assets, who assigned them missions, and who provided them support. Even with a mandate from Hap Arnold himself, the unit was constantly exposed to regular Air Corps officers who did not understand their mission and who fought to have their assets transferred elsewhere.
One could argue that a book that was simply on the operations would have been sufficiently interesting on its own. But in fairness, including the bureaucratic story that made the unit possible does present a full historical record.
Some readers may recognize Mr. Y'Blood's name from other works. Possibly his best known is Mig Alley: The Fight for Air Superiority: The US Air Force in Korea. He has written other books on small unit operations of the US Navy during World War II.
This book is well researched and features 42 pages of notes and references!
My only complaint is that it would have been helpful to of had more maps. There is one that shows the operations for Operation Thursday, and another for the 3rd Air Commando Group's operations in the Philippines. But for many of the operations over Burma, one only has a general sense of which direction they were done in.
Unfortunately, this was Mr. Y'Blood's last work. He passed away shortly after it was completed. But he has left behind a unique and detailed story that is seldom told elsewhere, and foreshadowed the US Air Force Special Operations of today.
The older I get, the more interested I have become in the less common or irregular operations of World War II.
I first became aware of the Air Commandos from a National Geographic article that released public information about Operation Thursday... the dropping of British troops by gliders well behind Japanese lines in Burma. The very notion just fires the imagination.
The author of this book also share this passion and spent years researching a story that had not been fully brought to light of these unusual forces, the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Air Commando.
The concept was borne out of tragedy. While Orde Wingate had successfully inserted British troops behind Japanese lines in earlier operations, their support had been minimal. Supplies and air cover were inadequate, and wounded men were left behind in the jungles for lack of any way to evacuate them.
Forward thinking USAAF officers proposed a unique solution: an air task force consisting of transport, gliders, liaison, fighter and light bomber aircraft dedicated to such missions. Thus was borne the Air Commando.
At first the British were skeptical that the Americans could provide the aircraft, let alone the support operations. But commitments were made coming from Hap Arnold himself, and the project proceeded.
There are many things to be learned from this book:
The hazards of flying over miles of jungle in an undeveloped country cannot be over stated. Because of shifting loyalties, pilots and crews who went down in this environment could not be sure if the local populace would safeguard them or turn them in. Some aircraft disappeared never to be seen again.
Weather was unpredictable and hazardous.
To my surprise, techniques were developed where gliders could be recovered and returned to the air immediately after use. This made them useful in a form of shuttle system. This was a precursor of the helicopter warfare of Vietnam.
Helicopters were pioneered for rescue operations in Burma. The men who flew these were truly brave, and not 100% sure of how reliable they would be operating in the environment.
While smaller in scale than the large cargo drops, the liaison aircraft proved vital. Landing in ridiculously short strips, or even river sandbars, they provided an evacuation capability that infinitely raised the morale of the troops on the ground. The 1st Air Commando Group also pioneered the use of below the wing supply bundles for supplying remote patrols, and provided a communications link in some of the remotest areas of the world.
Some of the flying that is described in this book is incredible. For example, late in the war the L5 liaison aircraft of the 3rd Air Commando flew over the open ocean from the Philippines to Okinawa for 7 hours, escorted by a Catalina and a couple of fighters. Even with extra fuel loaded, gas tanks were running dry by the time they arrived. All it would have taken would have been one ocean storm to have turned this into a disaster.
One entity that does not come off very well in this account is the Imperial Japanese Army Air Force. Later in the book, when fighter operations became more prevalent, there are very few mentions of actual dogfights. Most of the air encounters were very brief, and many of the JAAF aircraft were destroyed on the ground. As noted in the book, as the war went on, Japan pulled most of its air assets back to more vital theaters such as the Philippines and the home islands.
The best parts of the book were the descriptions of the operations.
The least interesting, but arguably necessary portions were the seemingly endless wrangling over organization and reporting structures.
It will be very clear to the reader after the first two chapters that the command relationships in the China Burma India theater were hopelessly muddled and the subject of constant revision. If that were not enough, the debates extended about to whom the Air Commandos reported to, who controlled their assets, who assigned them missions, and who provided them support. Even with a mandate from Hap Arnold himself, the unit was constantly exposed to regular Air Corps officers who did not understand their mission and who fought to have their assets transferred elsewhere.
One could argue that a book that was simply on the operations would have been sufficiently interesting on its own. But in fairness, including the bureaucratic story that made the unit possible does present a full historical record.
Some readers may recognize Mr. Y'Blood's name from other works. Possibly his best known is Mig Alley: The Fight for Air Superiority: The US Air Force in Korea. He has written other books on small unit operations of the US Navy during World War II.
This book is well researched and features 42 pages of notes and references!
My only complaint is that it would have been helpful to of had more maps. There is one that shows the operations for Operation Thursday, and another for the 3rd Air Commando Group's operations in the Philippines. But for many of the operations over Burma, one only has a general sense of which direction they were done in.
Unfortunately, this was Mr. Y'Blood's last work. He passed away shortly after it was completed. But he has left behind a unique and detailed story that is seldom told elsewhere, and foreshadowed the US Air Force Special Operations of today.
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