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Show IBM 'Nothing Can Stop the Army Air Force!' With B-29s ranging over Tokyo almost al-most daily it's tough for the imagination to conceive that three years ago our air forces' only asset as-set was the moxie of its men. . . . Bataan was saved at least once by the wizardry of our air force personnel, per-sonnel, who had plenty of ingenuity as well as courage. . . . Enemy ships I were trying to land troops on the shore one night. Though there were no bombers with which to stop them, our airmen weren't fazed. ... Mechanics rigged up three pursuit pur-suit ships with a device whereby two 300-pound bombs could be attached to the wings and released by pulling pull-ing a wire. . . . The three ships made three trips that night and bombed and strafed the Jap boats, preventing the troops from landing. . . . What made their feat of stalling stall-ing the Japs and gaining time for us even more of a miracle was that most of the pilots had never before flown at night! The newspapers not long ago carried car-ried a story telling how there were no trees in the far Aleutians and that pilots had brought in a single tree, planted it and labelled it "Umnak National Forest." What the news story failed to mention men-tion was why the tree had been flown in for the exclusive use of a flier's pet dog. A flyer who had been stationed on an island for too many months developed de-veloped a crush on a half-native girL who looked very beautiful after months in the South Pacific. ... In his barracks one day he was getting poetic about the girl when his buddy, thumbing through a movie magazine, suddenly turned to a photo of Betty Grable in a bathing bath-ing suit. . . . "How's this?" ex-, citedly asked the buddy, holding up the picture. The pilot took a brief look and snorted, "White trash!" On a recent bomber mission oyer Germany the flight ran into serious opposition from i both fighters and flak, and a B-17 was hit. A 20-mm. shell struck the top turret, and the gunner fell to the . floor covered with blood. ... A colonel who had come along as an observer rushed back to give first aid and, seeing see-ing the lad's rigid form, thought he was either dead or dying. . . . He was about to administer adminis-ter a hypodermic when the gunner gun-ner opened his eyes. . . . The colonel bent over him, putting his ear close to the lad's lips, expecting some last feeble words. . . . "Colonel," was the gunner's comment, "I'm beginning begin-ning to think there isn't much future in this racket." Despite - popular misconception, boys of the AAF aren't as pin-up-happy as people think. . . . This verse was penned several months ago by a B-17 radio operator-gunner who failed to return from a mission mis-sion over Italy: "Oh, Hedy Lamarr is a beautiful gal. . . . And Madeleine Made-leine Carroll is, too. . . . But you'll find, if you query, a different theory. . . . Amongst any bomber crew. . . . For the loveliest thing of which one could sing. . . . (This side ot the Heavenly Gates). ... Is no blonde or brunette of the Hollywood set. . . . But an escort of P-S8s." i Pet story of Gen. Hap Arnold, chief of the AAF, concerns the Wright brothers, who had repeatedly repeated-ly tried to fly a heavler-than-air craft Finally one December day, at Kitty Hawk, N. C, they did what no man had ever done before. They flew! . . . Elated, they wired their sister, Katherine: "We have actually actual-ly flown 120 feet. Will be, home for Christmas" . . . Katherine ran down the street and breathlessly handed the telegram the news scoop of the century to the city editor of the local lo-cal paper. He read it carefully and smiled: "Well, well! How nice the boys will be home for Christmas!" A fighter pilot (veteran of the famed Flying Tigers) took on half a dozen Jap planes in a dogfight and downed two. Then his ammunition ran out. . . . ' Ramming his plane into a third he bailed out and managed to land safely near the wreck. Removing Re-moving the one undamaged machine ma-chine grun from the debris be carried it to his base where he promptly reported to his commander, Gen. Claire Chen-nault: Chen-nault: "Sir, may I have another airplane for my machine gun?" During a raid on Scnweinfurs several months ago one of our bombers, "Battlin' Bobbie," was hit. and two of her engines were knocked out. . . . For 500 miles the bomber hedge-hopped over trees, roof tops and enemy pillboxes. . . . All the time as the plane limped along her crew kept praying (he two smoking engines wouldn't blow up. . . . When they finally reached home and the perspiring pilot climbed out of the ship, his comment was, "We made a chapel out of that airplane today." |