Designed from the very popular Douglas DC-3 which had been in service since 1936 and had it first flight in 1935, the C-47 was ordered due to the imminent US involvement in the war looming on the horizon. First flight of the new aircraft was on 23 December 1941 just 16 days after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Differing from it's airline cousin by having a cargo door and hoist and reinforced floor, The C-47 flew in every theater of WW II. A variant of the DC-3 was flown by the Japanese as Shōwa L2D and Nakajima L2D, and called the Tabby by the Allies.
After WWII the C-47 lived on and flew with several countries military services, Britian, France, Russia and the US just to name a few.
France having lost control of it's Indochina colonies to the Japanese during WWII, (Technically the French still held them as the Vichy French, just that Japan told them what to do and how to do it), moved to reassert control over the region right after WWII. In the long fight against the communist forces the C-47 was used greatly to resupply forces and to paradrop troops.
The C-47 flew for the US in Korea and in Vietnam in several guises. Today they can still be found flying for civilian airlines sove having been re engined with turboprop engines.
This build will use the Monogram/Revell (Monovell) 1/48 scale C-47 Skytrain as the basis for a French C-47 flown out of Tonkin (Indochina) in 1953. I plan on a straight OOB build save for the markings, which are Berna Decals BD 48-08 which I purchased from ebay. This set covers three French C-47's from Indochina 1953/54 time frame. One in OD over grey and one NMF upper and black lower and one all NMF.
That being said, lets get started.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPjrH_ofzy0