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Show Wj CPILT Cf .dd&Col. Robert L.Scoft w.n.u. release IrSL jhe story thus far: After graduating West Point as a second lieutenant Robert Scott wins his wings at Kelly Ftld and takes up pursuit flying. When lie war breaks out he Is an Instructor in California and told he Is too old for corn-hat corn-hat flying. He appeals to several Gen. als jof a chance to fly a combat plane, and anally the opportunity comes. He ays goodby to his wife and child and JjeJ a bomber to India, where he becomes be-comes a ferry pilot, which docs not appeal ap-peal to him. He visits General Chennault Chen-nault and Is promised a Klttyhawk, and ,ooii Is flying the skies over Burma In a ihlnlng Klttyhawk. He gets his first Jap bomber and goes out on many lone mis-lions mis-lions over enemy territory. nault was to be the Task Force Com- 1 mander and was to be over the Fighter Group and the Bomber Force. If the Scotch hadn't given out, I would have got drunk that night. But instead I went on another strafing straf-ing raid in the late afternoon, and had to land after dark. So I took it out in action. I bombed i Homalin and the railroad yards at Mongaung the next day, and strafed the field at Myitkyina coming back. During the ensuing days until the 26th of June, I carried out attacks on barges near Bhamo, and on one snow from a Christmas tree, and I laughed hysterically as two figures ran from a pagoda. That day I landed back home tired and happy. More orders had come for me: I was to go to Delhi before I went to China. I went there the next morning with "Long Johnny" Payne. When I had received my official instructions from headquarters in Delhi, and had been wined and dined by good friends war correspondents correspond-ents like Berrigan, Magoffin, and Briggs I came on back to pack my things in Assam. I tried to take the old fighter ship with me, but my crew had chiselled a new Allison engine from somewhere had probably proba-bly stolen it from some ship, but I didn't know where. So I went on over in a transport, expecting to come back later and ferry "Old Exterminator" Ex-terminator" to his new home. As we came down into the rain over the lake South of Kunming, I never have felt so good. This was another step to the East, towards Japan, and when I got out and saw all those sleek-looking fighting ships trip went to Shwebo and almost to Mandalay, making a round trip of nearly nine hundred miles. I strafed the field at Maymyo, caught a train on the railroad North of town, and set it on fire. It was anything for action and the engine of "Old Exterminator" Ex-terminator" got pretty rough at times, for by then I had three hundred hun-dred and sixty hours on it and my mechanics had had little experience with Allisons. That night, when I got home from my trip into Burma, I was handed a radiogram that saved my life. As CHAPTER XIV But I had seen enough. Even though this bridge was being built of bamboo, they were making it very strong, for the abutments were of heavier lumber and of stone. The Japanese were evidently planning to transport trucks, tanks, or some other oth-er heavier equipment North. I went right back to Dinjan and had Sergeant Ser-geant Bonner strap on a nice 500-pound 500-pound bomb with a delayed action fuse. At any rate the armament men told him It was a ten-second delay fuse. This type of target had to be hit exactly, and if I were to glide in for a dead shot I'd lurely get shot down by all the anti-.inroft anti-.inroft Sn I made ud my mind that my Group was going to receive from the AVG in five days, my spirits spir-its soared another mile in the air. I was through with all that lonesome "one-man war" stuff. From now at. n.AM Ka r,rTY,t;r,rr o e a team With t I " v long before I got there to turn it loose just as low as I could fly. Even If I missed the bridge by only fifty yards, which is close for dive-bombing in ships not made for that type of work, I'd knock a lot of leaves off the trees, make a big noise, and maybe kill some gunners. But the abutments of the bridge had to be hit Just about dead center if I was to make the Japs stop work. I came in to the target from the West, with the sun right at my back. I flew so low that I was afraid the little windmill on the nose of the bomb would get knocked off by the bushes. And then, as I law the bridge, I let the bomb go. All hell broke loose. When I got back home I looked at "Old Exterminator" and I couldn't lee why it hadn't spun in right there bombers escorted by fighter ships in a proper force to represent America. I had already met most of the members of the First American Volunteer Vol-unteer Group, but it was an even greater pleasure to meet them now. Some of them were men who were going to stay with the 23rd Fighter Group and fight under me. Of all the honors that I ever have received re-ceived or ever will receive, the greatest to me will always be the honor of being given command of that great group of sky fighters under un-der the Command of Gen. Claire L. Chennault. During the four days that followed I took over the military equipment of the Group from the Commander of the squadron that was based at Kunming, and I got my headquar-tr headquar-tr staff nrffanized. In this Army, over the N'umzup. There were holes 03 big as footballs in the fabric dippers and in the metal stabilizers of the tail section. There was a hole In the fuselage and five holes in the wing. But I guess the hill just East of the target had saved me. As the June days passed. Colonel Haynes was moved to China to head the Bomber Command under General Gen-eral Chennault, and I Was left alone as Commanding Officer of the Ferrying Ferry-ing Command. On the day the cheerful cheer-ful Haynes left, I felt as if I had lost my best and last friend. For this meant that I'd have to stay on the ground more, and work the administration admin-istration as well as the operations of the ABC, which was getting tougher and tougher with all the rice we were having to drop and the passengers passen-gers we were having to haul. On the one day that I stayed on the ground, it seemed to me that every time I looked up from the desk . that I was "flying," some long, lanky tea planter would be standing there In the door in sun-helmet and shorts. With his bony knees sticking out, he'd ask me in cold clipped accents: ac-cents: "I say old chap do you have transportation for Calcutta?" From over near Sadiya, we had gotten eight elephants, tame ones, and were working them to move ome heavy timbers to be used on the warehouses of the new field. There was an old Southern sergeant who took good care of the pachyderms. pachy-derms. He must have been a mule-skinner mule-skinner in either the first World War or the border war with Mexico, for he did everything in his power to keep the eight elephants dry and Sergeant LaKue of the 23rd Fighter Fight-er Group. Everything has happened fast In this war, and the organization organiza-tion of the 23rd Fighter Group was no exception. There was no holiday, even if it was activated on the Fourth of July. I read it my face must have turned white; I know that tears came to my eyes, for I felt them burn. But I didn't care. I was ordered to report re-port in Kunming, China, to General Chennault, as Commanding Officer of the 23rd Fighter Group which was to be activated from the AVG on July 4, 1942. I wiped the tears from my eyes and looked out on an improving im-proving world. I could hear the birds singing again, and people were laughing; I knew I was the luckiest man in all the world. I carefully folded the radiogram to show my grandchildren when the war was over and went out to look at my ship. For I had something else on my mind too. I was going to go into Burma the next day on four of the damnedest strafing and bombing raids the Japs had ever seen. It would be my swan-song from Assam and I had to celebrate in some way or other. I told my crew to load a 500-pound 500-pound HE on "Old Exterminator," and I walked around looking the old ship over. Somehow I figured that Kittyhawk had had a lot to do with getting me the greatest job in the war. It's not every man who finally gets what he has always wanted in the Army after being pulled out of fighters for being too old, after be-ine be-ine an instructor for four years, aft- Master Sergeants showing officers what to do have always been the backbone of a fighting force, and I will never forget Master Sergeant McNeven. I was certainly expecting expect-ing to lead the group in its fights against the Japanese, and the administrative ad-ministrative work that the Sergeant Major of the 23rd Fighter Group accomplished ac-complished so efficiently made it possible for me to fly and have the paper-work go on at the same time. Later in the week I heard that "Old Exterminator" was ready with a new engine. But with the report came another that some other Group was moving into Assam, and that the engineering officer had stated he knew nothing about that ship 41-1456 41-1456 belonging to the Chinese Government. Gov-ernment. It would stay in India, he said. I went on and flew back to India in one of the P-40E's that we had just received from the factory that repairs them in China. Landing at my old base, I waited until dark, and then had the numbers num-bers on the ship that I had flown in exchanged with those of my old fighter. For morale purposes alone, we had to have that ship in the 23rd Group. All this change involved was a stencilling operation to put 41-1456 on the ship that I had flown from China, and another to put on "Old Exterminator" the serial number num-ber of the fighter that I was leaving in India. So, early the next morning, July 3, 1942, "me and the old Kittyhawk" wended our happy way across the hills and jungles of Burma to Kunming Kun-ming and more adventures together. From that moment, we left the Air From that moment, we left the Air Corps number 41-1456 on that insignificant in-significant ship in India, and for all practical purposes the old P-40E that I had used for sixty-three days over Burma became another number,, num-ber,, but it would always be "Old Exterminator" to me. In those two months we'd flown together 371 hours over enemy territory and we were more than friends. That is somewhat some-what over eighty thousand miles, and in combat that's a long, long way. Everything has happened fast in this war, and the organization of the 23rd Fighter Group was no exception. excep-tion. There was no holiday, even if it was activated on the Fourth of July. There was no time for celebration. cele-bration. Radio Tokyo started right off with a bang, and we definitely knew hard work was ahead. On the night of July 3, Radio Tokyo the one program we could ever hear in China warned the new American fighter group that they would quickly annihilate them, for it was common knowledge that the experienced ex-perienced AVG personnel were leav-ing leav-ing for America. But Tokyo had reckoned without the strategic brain of the General, or the loyalty of those great pilots of the First American Amer-ican Volunteer Group. The General was expecting an attack at-tack on Independence Day anyway, for the Japs had always shown an affinity for raids on our holidays. When the Japs arrived over Kwei-lin, Kwei-lin, expecting to find green and inexperienced in-experienced fighter pilots, they found ma.iy Americar boys who for weeks had been flying with the AVG. (TO BE CONTTXtJED well-fed and content Even when he ' tied the chains to their legs at night, he would wrap the links with cloth to keep them from chafing the thick skin of the big beasts. Another sergeant, from about the lame section of the country that the old elephant caretaker hailed from, came by one day and looked the stalls over with a quizzical eye. "Say, Micky," he called back as he left, "you're taking too good care of those elephants. You're going to get 'em so comfortable that the Yankees Yan-kees will come down here and free 'em." Bob Layher, one of the AVG pilots, pi-lots, eame over for several days, and we drank good Scotch whiskey at night and flew our planes across Into Burma in the day when I didn't have to get passengers on the freight ships. I learned a lot, flying fly-ing on his wing. We'd go over for a look at Myitkyina, and It would amaze me how effortlessly, without apparent forethought. Bob would get our ships into the sun before we came within sight of the fleld we were to observe. I picked up little things like that as I flew with him, and they helped me later. On the twentieth of June, members mem-bers of the Army Board that had been appointed to Induct the AVG passed through Assam, and my hopes faded of ever getting over to work under General Chennault I knew hat out of those Colonels, the powers-that-be had surely picked some lucky one to get the greatest Job In the world. This was of course that of commanding the AVG after it came into the Army, with its nucleus of old AVG personnel and the new pilots as replacements from home in the States. General Chen- er being shanghaied into being a Burma-roadster, important as the job had been. Well, I had got what I wanted and I felt as though I could Jump over the moon. I patted pat-ted the leering shark's mouth on old 41-1456, and caressed the prop that had taken me in and out of many messes. Then I left, while they pulled the belly tank and put the big, fat yellow bomb under the belly, bel-ly, 'and tightened the sway braces. The sight of that bomb made me feel pretty good. Next morning before dawn I was in the air, my course set for Homalin Homa-lin As I climbed out above the clouds I began to recite poetry in rhythm with the engine. To the verses of "Gunga Din" I dropped my first bomb of the day on the docks of Homalin. Then I flew back home with the words of the "Galley Slave" going out over the radio in a private broadcast to the world. On my next trip I dropped a five-hundred-pounder on a barge at Bhamo and came back and strafed the much-abused Myitkyina. My third attack was on the railroad station at Mogaung and I strafed the empty freight-cars in the yard. I had to use a belly tank on the fourth trip, and so I couldn't take a big bomb. But I loaded on six eighteen-pound frags and set sail for Lashio. I remembered re-membered to drop the belly tank before I went down into the antiaircraft, anti-aircraft, and I dropped the six little frags in two of the big green ware-hcuses ware-hcuses by the railroad tracks. I shot up the field but saw no planes, and I finished my ammunition by I strafing the main street of the town. I saw two plate-class windows spatter spat-ter across the street like artificial |