The Flight Jacket: A Novel about VMB-612, the Marine Corps' B-25 PBJ Night Bombing Squadron

by Laulie Powell

In 1943, the Marine Corps acquired the B-25, renaming it the PBJ. A medium-weight bomber, over fifty feet long with an almost seventy-foot wingspan, it had two fourteen-cylinder Wright cyclone engines, located mid-wing, and the capacity for a long range, upwards of eleven hours of flying time from additional gas tanks. The Marines used this plane to create eight bomber squadrons, but only one equipped to operate at night with the new invention, radar. This is a story about that singularly unique squadron, VMB-612, from its inception at Peterfield Point, North Carolina, to its final days serving as a taxi service for the diplomats and bureaucrats flowing into the martial government in post-war Japan. All in their early twenties and late teens, the pilots and enlisted men of the squadron endured the hardships of war in the Pacific unique to an airplane squadron, and the driving pace of operations as American forces moved toward Japan. Confident of defeating the Japanese with no thought given to anything other than victory, the men learned the hard reality of it’s a cruel, devastating, and deadly business.

202 pages, Paperback

Published May 11, 2020

About the author

Born in Jacksonville, Florida in 1955, I'm the oldest in a family of four daughters. In 1982, I graduated from the University of Florida Law School and began working at my dream job as a Public Defender in my home town. Five years later, disillusioned with the sheer number of guilty clients and the grind of the job, I saw the following ad in my law school newsletter, "The Marine Corps is looking for a few good lawyers." I called the phone number in the ad and my twenty year adventure with and in the Marine Corps began. I worked in prosecution, defense and appellate prosecution. I became the Adjutant at Marine Barracks "8th and I." I went on to become the Aide to the Secretary of the Navy, and from there the Staff Judge Advocate at Marine Corps Base Hawaii. Before the war with Iraq began in 2003, I was the Assistant Staff Judge Advocate for Marine Corps Central Command in Bahrain. My last job was on the staff of U.S. Pacific Command. While at Pacific Command, I had a stroke affecting my ability to speak. Fortunately, it didn't affect my ability to think and write. Since retirement, I have written two books loosely based on my time in the Marine Corps. Next year (2020), I will publish The Flight Jacket, the story of my father's squadron during WWII.