Baa Baa Black Sheep (13 page)

The Third Pursuit were not dummies, to begin with; furthermore, they were not in any air force and it wasn’t in their contracts, so they politely said nuts to this corny racket. So Chennault bundled himself up, flying down to Loiwing, saying that he was going to give a dishonorable discharge to any pilot who refused to strafe as ordered.

This expression, dishonorable discharge, became so monotonous. It was used whenever anyone wanted anything done in the group. From the manner in which our glorious staff took this expression up, I ventured a guess that many of them had suffered the real McCoy from various services. Actually, I thought one guy had gone mad, because he was talking about giving civilians dishonorable discharges.

Maybe he was going to put General George Custer of the Little Big Horn fame to shame, for he apparently wanted to fight to the last pilot, but ours was unlike Custer’s situation in a couple of ways. One, he wasn’t with his troops, and secondly, because the Japs couldn’t surround us, we were supposed to put ourselves in that position individually by strafing between jungle trees.

Perhaps this was more than a parallel in my case, because of my Sioux blood. I know a few who didn’t share the historical accounting of Custer. The guys who kicked hell out of Custer took him for an egotistical sucker.

The outcome of Chennault’s parley with the Third Pursuit
was—they didn’t scare. So he flew back to Kunming—and what a talk he put on—the world’s best. And he ended up talking parts of the First and Second Pursuits into a strafing mission on Chiengmai, Thailand.

By then he had backed up a wee bit, for at least there was logic to what he proposed to us. For my money, his purpose was to show up the boys in the Third Pursuit. And indeed, I felt much the same as I imagine a scab would going through a picket line, for there was money offered to us in our strafing mission.

I volunteered for this venture, a habit I couldn’t seem to break, not because of bravery, for only my Chinese laundry-man and I held the secret of mortal fear. I don’t believe that I would have refused even had I known that Madame Chiang was threatening a separate peace with Japan at this time. Her threat was given to force more aid from America for the Kuomintang Government.

Come to think of it, a couple of spectacles I witnessed undoubtedly led me to volunteer, just to get away from the horrible place and the people in Kunming.

The first of these spectacles was a rather queer procession going by in front of our hostel. A ragged Chinese with feathers tied to his matted hair was being pushed along in front of this procession, which included an officer on horseback, a few soldiers, and some Chinese in rickshas. There were about a hundred in all, and most of these were on foot.

The procession stopped in the cemetery in front of our hostel while the officer got down from his mount and the people climbed out of the rickshas. The ragged man with the feathers was forced to kneel on the ground. These soldiers turned out to be a firing squad and in a few minutes sent a volley into the back of the poor devil kneeling on the ground. As he fell forward onto his face after the shots, the accompanying crowd broke into excited shouting, running up to kick and stab at the crushed form.

Soon the officer walked up, motioning the crowd back and leaning over as if to examine the bleeding form. He slowly unbuckled his automatic, pointing it at the back of the victim’s head, then fired.

This apparently ended the affair as the procession quietly left the cemetery the way they had entered; the Oriental faces had a look that appeared as emotionless as time.

Yes, this was all, except that a body is left four days, and if no relatives claim it for burial the state takes over. But if there are no claimants, and the state is not prompt, then the starved, chowlike dogs get a free meal.

Upon inquiring into what traitorous deed or murder this unfortunate had committed, we found to our surprise that he had been caught stealing. Let me remind you that stealing was legal in the Orient; we had visited the thieves’ market in Kunming, which covered several square blocks. The only thing that was illegal was getting caught before the articles were in the market.

The second revolting spectacle was when we ran into a parade downtown one night. This seemingly endless procession had the paper dragons and disguises of all natures in brilliant colors, moving along in centipede fashion like a long worm through the narrow, crooked streets.

The part in particular that got me was when two men, naked excepting for loincloths, were brought along in this parade. These two almost nude men had their hands tied and were jerked along by collar-and-leash affairs. They were emaciated and dirty, and their faces were expressionless.

Upon getting someone to explain this I found that these two men, poor souls, were Japanese prisoners who had survived in captivity for some time.

So it might be small wonder that I left Kunming for Loiwing, again with no regrets, even if it meant endangering my life.

We arrived in Loiwing preparing for our strafing mission on Chiengmai, Thailand. The pilots who were stationed there were the Third Pursuit Chennault had just gotten back from talking to in regard to all the strafing at random. They were anything but warm to us when they found we were going. In fact one pilot said: “I knew somebody would strafe. But I don’t think it’s for free, like us.”

Our Chennault strafers didn’t have to watch the Third Pursuit and their glares that night, because we got to stay in the beautiful American hostel on the hilltop. This hostel had been built for the staff of the Central Aircraft Manufacturing Company, who were supposedly running that farce called a lend-lease factory.

The hostel where they lived was a gorgeous layout, but the so-called factory didn’t impress me at all, even though I
am B.S. in A.E. I never found out whether the factory ever completed aircraft one, but that was not important, I believe. The main idea was that they lived like kings in this hostel, which, for but few differences, might have been a swanky country club back home. The view was ideal, also, as large plate-glass windows overlooked the mountainous valley and winding river below.

The defending Third didn’t live in the hostel, for they were a little different class than these lend-lease friends. They had been housed in far less pretentious quarters down near a crummy Chinese village. In fact the only reason I can figure out why we were spending the night was that we were going along with Chennault’s program and the Third had refused.

Whether the phrase “getting the word” is a general one here I do not know. But I do know that in a private sort of informal way the phrase was rather general with us out there
in China, and referred to people having a feeling they are not going to live through something.

U.S.S. Yorktown

Maybe I imagined it this night in the American hostel, but Jack Newkirk was not the same smiling Jack I had attended a few shore leaves with off the U.S.S.
Yorktown
prior to the war. Nor was he the same as he was when I had flown with him in Rangoon. Previously always an affable gent, but this night he just didn’t want to talk at all—about anything.

There was another, “Black Mac” McGerry, who was an unusually quiet sort ordinarily, and I truly enjoyed spending this night in Black Mac’s company at the hostel. Mac and I had pooled our resources and purchased a couple bottles of scotch from our hosts, and settled down in front of the spacious windows to enjoy ourselves. We were very much alone, and as the evening wore on Mac became loquacious for a change. He reminisced, at the time, about how his family would be shocked if it were possible for them to see him enjoying a bottle of whisky.

Little did I know, while we were drinking, that I would run into Mac’s brother upon my return to the United States and have to leave out part of this enjoyable evening with Mac. For I thought Mac dead, and wanted to give him the part of Mac that I thought he would cherish in his memory.

Morning came and I skipped breakfast, as I recall. We were briefed by Newkirk and some pilot from my own squadron. We were to leave that afternoon in order to arrive at a lonesome base somewhere in a Burma outpost near sundown to keep the Nips from getting wise.

The lot of us were to remain in this practically vacated RAF emergency field overnight. On the following morning we were to take off in two groups, Newkirk’s Second Pursuit, and our own First Pursuit, and the take-off was to be in the dark.

The plan was to arrive over the Chiengmai airstrip in the morning at the exact instant—and it lasts for only a minute or so—when one can see the ground from the air and they cannot see you. Therefore, we had split ourselves into two groups because we wanted to make certain one group hit at the exact time. After strafing the airport and its aircraft we were to return immediately to this RAF outpost, gas, and be gone in a hurry.

We flew into this base just before dark because the only air-raid warning they had there was a bugler on a hilltop some two miles from the base, meaning that our people were given just sufficient time to flop on their faces in a trench if the Japanese were to come over. So we went into this field of ours at dusk so that the Nips might not see us and come over and strafe our planes when they lay on the ground.

After we had gassed up our planes late that evening in the dark, we finally went to wash off the caked dust and get a bite to eat before turning it. We were going to have to take off at four o’clock, in the dark, the following morning.

I was standing beside Jack Newkirk in this RAF washroom, which consisted of a bamboo hut. A little RAF sergeant came up to us and said in cockney: “Hi, fellows. It’s all right to use that water to wash your face and hands in, but don’t drink it or brush your teeth with it because it’s polluted.”

Both Jack and I said: “Thanks,” and the sergeant walked away.

But the first thing I noticed Jack do was to dip his toothbrush into this polluted water and start to brush his teeth.

I looked at Jack and said: “Jack, didn’t you hear what that guy said?”

Jack grinned at me and smiled, then he said: “Well, after tomorrow, I don’t think it’ll make any difference.”

They awakened us all the next morning. Morning, hell, it was pitch dark, with no moon. It seemed like the middle of the night to me.

All we had for bearing on take-off from the rolling dirt strip were a couple of trucks parked on the field with their headlights turned on dim. Everybody got off, all eight in each group. And we joined on our respective leaders, who were to navigate us over the mountains and jungle in the darkness. No running lights. Merely the reddish-blue glare from our own exhaust stacks to fly formation on.

What was passing by in the jungle below us, or how close we came to any mountains, was in my imagination only. Finally light started to appear in the sky above us. And then I could begin to see dim outlines below me.

At about this same time our lead planes turned sharp left like they were going to run into a mountain. They started to dive. I wheeled my plane and dove after them, although I
couldn’t make out any target as yet. Even before I saw the field I saw tracers from the guns of my mates preceding me. Then the field seemed to take shape in the semi-darkness. I sighted in on the same place where the previous tracers had gone, some of these tracers were visible ricocheting as if being fired from the opposite direction.

The first pass got three transports ablaze, which, owing to their size, were the easiest to pick out that time of the morning. In turn the burning transports helped to light up our target area as we wheeled around for a pass in the opposite direction. I don’t see how any of us knew which one of us was which.

The second pass was made under much better visibility, even in those few seconds it took to turn around. It was evident our attack had come as a complete surprise, for I strafed down a line of planes that were parked as I remembered before the war at old Squadron II at the Navy training center in Pensacola, Florida.

I could see blurred forms jumping off wings, out of cockpits, and scurrying all over the field like ants. I made two more passes, witnessing fires all over the Chiengmai airfield.

By the time we made the last couple of passes the air was so full of black puffs of anti-aircraft fire it was difficult to determine whether the Japs had launched any aircraft, or even to see our other P-40s.

Radio silence was broken finally when someone yelled: “Let’s get to hell out of here.”

And as we pulled away individually, I saw a P-40 throwing smoke. This was just a little while after we had left Chiengmai and were over the jungle. The pilot’s engine apparently stopped and he rolled his plane over on its back. In a second or so I could see his parachute open, and see him swing back and forth on the ends of his strings, settle down, and disappear into the jungle below.

When we got back to our base, I found out that chute had belonged to Black Mac. I knew that he had landed alive. I only prayed that he would be able to find his way through the jungle without running into any Jap patrols.

Mac was never heard from until after the war, for the natives had turned him in to the Japs, and he was held in Thailand for the duration. I saw him after the war, but if I
thought he had been quiet before, it was nothing compared to when I met him after the war. Though I have inquired about him many times since, he appears to have drifted out of circulation on his own this time. I can only imagine that he had it pretty rough, although he did not say.