On Sat, 1 May 2004 11:42:36 +0200, "Emmanuel Gustin"
wrote:

The hit probability with such
weapons was probably far too low to justify carrying the heavy
weapons and endangering the life of the gunners.

I am continually amazed at how many planes were indeed shot down by
bomber gunners.

W/O Hazzard was flying a Lockheed Hudson light bomber (the windows of
the transport still in place!) on a solo raid of the Japanese airfield
at Akyab in May 1942. Three Nakajima Hayabusas (Oscars) chased him out
to sea. He flew at low level so they couldn't get beneath him, and
they took turns taking runs on him.

His rear gunner was the aptly named Sgt McLuckie. I'm not sure how
sophisticated his sight was, but he winged one of the Hayabusas badly
enough that it turned back to Burma. The second attack was made by Col
Kato, commander of the 64th Sentai and the most famous army fighter
pilot in Japan. (The Japanese did have some individual heroes.)
McLuckie lit up Kato's Hayabusa, and the colonel made the obligatory
suicide divide into the sea.

That was May 21?, 1942. All of Japan went into mourning, and Kato was
promoted two grades to buck general and enshrined as a war god. His
diary was published in the newspapers. It was much bigger shock to
Japan than the Midway defeat (about which the navy did not admit
much), and the whole tenor of Japanese newspapers changed to one of
bitter resolve from the previous triumphalism.

The British learned of it on the radio and decorated Hazzard. I'm not
sure about McLuckie.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email: (put Cubdriver in subject line)

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