P-39s, Zeros & A-24s

"Chris Mark" wrote in message
...
rom: Cub Driver look@my

they were returning with empty guns?

Certainly a possibility. Even if they still had ammo for their cowl guns
they
might have learned by that time in the war that attacking an alert and
ready
B-25 formation with 30 cals was pretty pointless. The B-25 turret gunners
alone would have outmatched them. The C model had 3/4" steel plate armor
across the rear of the radio compartment bulkhead, thus protecting the
interior
of the fuselage from gunfire from the rear. It would have easily stopped
light
machinegun fire.

Somewhere I've got an account of a B-25-Zero duel. If I find it I'll post
pertinent parts. It was written by Hobart Skidmore. He was a combat
correspondent who probably saw a lot more of the air war than most air
crew.
He was always ready to go and went out on night B-17 raids to Rabaul, B-25
and
B-26 raids against Lae and Salamaua, C-47 supply drops to Aussie troops on
the
Kokoda Track, you name it.
I heard that many years after the war he began to suffer from nightmares
about
his war experiences so terrible that they drove him to suicide. Don't
know if
that is really true.


Chris Mark

Saburo Sakai the number two Jap Ace was shot up by flying betreen two B-25's
as reported in his book
"SAMURAI" He spent months recovering and lost the use of one eye.
B-25's were treated with respect by the "Zeke's" as reported in the book on
B-25's in the Pacific campaign
"Warpath across the pacific" A very expensive book ($75) but GREAT photos of
the 8 50 cal's in the nose.

Larry