The AC-47 of WWII

[MIflyer]

Just read an article about the First Combat Cargo Group of the USAAF. They flew C-47A's in the CBI for delivering a paratroopers and their supplies> When the Japanese approached Kwelin the British threw open the warehouses and allowed them to take whatever they wished. Some crews got .30 cal machine guns on twin mounts and mounted them in the open hole made by the removal of the forward cargo door. And after drop missions some would "get lost" and fly over Japanese held areas at low altitude, shooting at anything they saw moving.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Just read an article about the First Combat Cargo Group of the USAAF. They flew C-47A's in the CBI for delivering a paratroopers and their supplies> When the Japanese approached Kwelin the British threw open the warehouses and allowed them to take whatever they wished. Some crews got .30 cal machine guns on twin mounts and mounted them in the open hole made by the removal of the forward cargo door. And after drop missions some would "get lost" and fly over Japanese held areas at low altitude, shooting at anything they saw moving.

A link would be great. That sounds like good reading.

 

[MIflyer]

That article was published in the Friends of the Air Force Museum newsletter, about 20 years ago. I must have it in paper copy somewhere, but they recently reminded the membership of it. So there is no link.

By the way, some years ago on another website I related how a friend of mine was being trained in 1945 to be a gunner on B-32's, which would be used as gunships in the invasion of Japan, flying low to strafe. Some guy responded that could never have occurred because it was against USAAF Doctrine. Since then I found an article about B-25's being used to strafe in Burma, and now this article about the C-47 "recreational" strafing in that same theater. And of course everyone knows abut the Battle of the Bismarck Sea and the use of modified B-25's, A-20's, and Beaufighters for strafing, resulting in the B-25G, B-25J, and B-25H strafing versions as well as the very heavily armed A-26 strafers. None of those were developed per "USAAF Doctrine" but rather by local innovation being recognized as a success.

Long range fighter escort was not USAAF Doctrine, either, and we know how that turned out.

Use of 155MM artillery for direct fire on hardened targets was not "doctrine" either, and when the US Army used that approach in Aachen, the German general commanding the defense of the city said that such use of artilery should be outlawed. Innovation is usually very unpopular with some people.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Man, those B-32s would take a beating flying low enough to strafe. You have to go to school to learn how to miss something that big.

 

[MIflyer]

Man, those B-32s would take a beating flying low enough to strafe. Y

Well, they probably would have been fighting against soldiers with no more than bolt action rifles and civilians armed with sharp sticks.

Japan is far enough from Okinawa to make CAS a challenge. Fighters would need drop tanks instead of bombs and would not have much loiter time. I guess that P-47N's could have handled it but not much else.

 

[GrauGeist]

Japan had withdrawn it's best fighters and equipment for defense of the homeland, including medium and heavy tanks that weren't fielded anywhere else.

You can be sure that had the Atom Bombs not been dropped, you'd be reading about them in action.

 

[EwenS]

Japan is far enough from Okinawa to make CAS a challenge. Fighters would need drop tanks instead of bombs and would not have much loiter time. I guess that P-47N's could have handled it but not much else.

Okinawa to Kyushu about 400 miles. Kyushu to Tokyo about 600 miles.

CAS in the early days of both Operation Olympic (invasion of Kyushu planned for 1 Nov 1945) and Operation Coronet (invasion of Honshu planned for 1 March 1946) would have been a USN responsibility.

The US Fifth Fleet, responsible for making the landings for Olympic, was to include some 36 CVE both to protect the various forces on the approach and during the landings, and provide CAS once the troops were ashore, just as they had done in previous Pacific landings but on a larger scale. Those would have included about 8 of the big Commencement Bay class with USMC air groups specially trained for CAS.

Those carriers are in addition to 5 USN fast carrier task groups assigned to 3rd & 5th Fleets (14/15 CV + 6 CVL) plus 2 task groups from the BPF (4/5 fleet carriers + 4 light fleet carriers).

The objective of Olympic was to grab real estate for airfields to help support Coronet. It was only intended to take the southern part of Kyushu to achieve that. Once successful landings had been made, airfield construction could begin immediately and USAAF & USMC units begin to move in.

It is worth bearing in mind how things worked during Operation Overlord. Emergency strips opened within a couple of days, rearming strips a few days after that with the first units moving from southern England within a couple of weeks or so.

Edit:- Same thing happened in the Pacific with the landings on Leyte and Okinawa. Leyte landings 17 Oct, first USAAF units moved into reconditioned and expanded airfields from 24/25 Oct. Okinawa the first USMC moved into Kadena 9 days after the invasion.

There were at least 13 Japanese airfields and landing grounds in southern Kyushu in the immediate vicinity of the areas of the intended US landing beaches. USAAF close support depends on how quickly these could be captured or other sites identified and turned into airfields.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Well, they probably would have been fighting against soldiers with no more than bolt action rifles and civilians armed with sharp sticks.

I'm not so sure about that. They sure had plenty of heavy machine guns and 37mm on Okinawa, according to Sledge in With the Old Breed.

 

[GrauGeist]

Read about Operation Ketsu-Go - the Japanese had not only accurately guessed Operation Olympic's landing time, but landing zone.
They also had a tremendous stockpile of top of the line equipment, fuel, ammunition as well as front line troops all organized under a unified command between Army and Navy (surprisingly enough).

If you think Okinawa was a savage fight, the invasion of Kyushu would have made Dante's Inferno look like a Sunday picnic.

OPERATION KETSU-GO