How long do you think that MacArthur could have held out in the Philippines?

[John Dudek]

Since Joe called 'foul on this just above, I'll comment on something that slipped by me:

 

Just WTF is a "2nd Line HB"? The USAAC didn't HAVE any Heavy Bombers except the B-17 operational on 1/1/42. All the B-17Cs had been upgraded to Ds, and almost all of them were in or enroute to the PI.

 

As for "2nd Line MBs," I suppose those would be B-10/12s or B-18s. Although calling the B-18 "2nd Line" is like saying the whole USAAC was 2nd Line - there wasn't anything newer in service yet.

 

As for "1st Line Fighters," there damn sure weren't any P-39s in FEAF, and I doubt the whole Air Corps had 503 P-9s and P-40s operational by April Fool's Day.

 

IIRC, there were a handful of B-24's operating with the Fifth Airforce at this time. They were mainly utilized as transports, but I would imagine they could be used as bombers as well. I know they were used in the DEI, in and around Java.

[JOE BRENNAN]

Just WTF is a "2nd Line HB"? The USAAC didn't HAVE any Heavy Bombers except the B-17 operational on 1/1/42. All the B-17Cs had been upgraded to Ds, and almost all of them were in or enroute to the PI.

 

As for "2nd Line MBs," I suppose those would be B-10/12s or B-18s. Although calling the B-18 "2nd Line" is like saying the whole USAAC was 2nd Line - there wasn't anything newer in service yet.

 

As for "1st Line Fighters," there damn sure weren't any P-39s in FEAF, and I doubt the whole Air Corps had 503 P-9s and P-40s operational by April Fool's Day.

John D mentioned the B-24's, LB-30's diverted from Lend Lease in early 1942. They were used on combat missions in DEI/Australia in that period in mixed formations with B-17E's flown in both across the Pacific and eastabout across Africa and India (another question is whether those latter planes would administratively count as 'FEAF'). The second line planes would have been the remnant of the B-17C/D's of the original Philippines force which had been flown down to Australia/DEI but were already too war weary or repaired from extensive combat damage to be used in frontline ops. One of them, 40-3097 "The Swoose", still exists; at least one other Philippine B-17 made it to the end of that period, 40-2072 which was used as a transport.

As I already mentioned, the apparent inconsistency there is between the bomber and fighter numbers, former looks about right for a/c actually in forward theaters of Pacific not including HI, latter could be right if including HI and maybe whole pipeline of planes committed to any forces in Pacific. Hawaiian AF was redesignated 7th AF in Feb '42 and was eventually part of the new FEAF in 1944, so depends what 'FEAF' means in that USAAF Stats Digest table, and whether it's consistent.

 

Joe

[KingSargent]

IIRC, there were a handful of B-24's operating with the Fifth Airforce at this time. They were mainly utilized as transports, but I would imagine they could be used as bombers as well. I know they were used in the DEI, in and around Java.

There sure weren't any on 01/01/1942.

 

There wasn't even a 5thAAF! (not outside of CONUS, anyway)

[capt_starlight]

There sure weren't any on 01/01/1942.

 

There were some LB-30 (repossessed British Liberator II) engaged in operations in the Java Sea on 27FEB42. Units that operated them in the Pacific at that time came from the Seventh and Nineteenth Bomb Groups.

[KingSargent]

There were some LB-30 (repossessed British Liberator II) engaged in operations in the Java Sea on 27FEB42. Units that operated them in the Pacific at that time came from the Seventh and Nineteenth Bomb Groups.

Please note that 27/02/42 is considerably later than 01/01/42. Singapore had fallen by then, amongst other events.

 

Another issue would be classifying the B-24 (even the LB-30) as "2ndLine" compared to the B-17D. Both lacked armor and power-operated defensive turrets.

[Rich]

Since Joe called 'foul on this just above, I'll comment on something that slipped by me:

 

Just WTF is a "2nd Line HB"? The USAAC didn't HAVE any Heavy Bombers except the B-17 operational on 1/1/42. All the B-17Cs had been upgraded to Ds, and almost all of them were in or enroute to the PI.

 

As for "2nd Line MBs," I suppose those would be B-10/12s or B-18s. Although calling the B-18 "2nd Line" is like saying the whole USAAC was 2nd Line - there wasn't anything newer in service yet.

 

As for "1st Line Fighters," there damn sure weren't any P-39s in FEAF, and I doubt the whole Air Corps had 503 P-9s and P-40s operational by April Fool's Day.

 

Ask the compilers of the statistical digest?

 

I think part of the problem is the nomenclature in this context apparently doesn't refer to "top shelf" versus "second best", I think its actually "operational" versus "non-operational"? Except that nowhere have I ever found where they defined the terms, even in the original copy I have from Maxwell?

 

But its a real interesting question, what and where were all those fighters they were referring to? I'll see what i can dig out.

[Rich]

Please note that 27/02/42 is considerably later than 01/01/42. Singapore had fallen by then, amongst other events.

 

King, it looks like the strength may be date of assignment in some cases rather than actual "on the ground", which is odd? The LB-30 were assigned to the 11th and 40th (and possibly the 435th) HBS of the 7th and 19th Groups, which began departing for Java circa 1 January (#573 crashed at MacDill on takeoff 1 January as did #575 on 2 January at San Diego, both were en route on the Java mission), but it's possible they started sometime earlier in December as well, which would then match the SD? It is possible to identify nine in Java by serial number, plus the two that crashed en route, which pretty well matches the number reported by the SD. But the earliest I can confirm an aircraft in Java is 7 January, when #576 crashed there.

[KingSargent]

King, it looks like the strength may be date of assignment in some cases rather than actual "on the ground", which is odd?

Procedurally odd, but it makes more sense given the posted numbers and types. Some of the bombers could ferry (with rather nasty results for LB-30 crews), but fighters would have to go by ship, which could lead to a lot of discrepancies between 'assigned' and 'on site and opeational' figures. I imagine the 59 P-40s sunk off Java in the Langley and Water Witch(?) would be officially "on strength" of FEAF then, even if they did nobody any good (except boosting Jaanese scores).

 

You might be right about "2nd Line" meaning non-operational, but the figures given indicate a percentage of planes operational higher than most I've seen. Maybe "2ndLine" was cannibalizable hangar queens?

[Rich]

But its a real interesting question, what and where were all those fighters they were referring to? I'll see what i can dig out.

 

From a quick glance at Craven and Cate I find:

 

 

18 P-40 and 52 A-24 arrived in Australia on 22 December, but missing trigger motors and solenoids for the A-24 and Prestone for the P-40.

 

14 B-17 made it from Del Monte to Darwin in January.

 

By January plans were in place for the “early transfer” of 80 HB, 114 MB, and 480 P to Australia and the NEI. 3 B-17 were to leave 24 December, 3 more on 25 December and then at a rate of 6 per day. It was anticipated that 55 P would arrive by 8 January and an additional 125 by 18 January.

 

By 6 January 20 B-17 and 6 LB-30 were en route, 45 B-17 and 9 LB-30 were being prepared. Eventually 66 B-17 and 15 LB-30 were sent by the early overseas routes, arriving in Australia and Java, the rest were diverted, mostly to India.

 

By 25 January 112 P-40 had arrived in Australia and 160 more by 4 February.

 

By 18 March a total of 337 P-40, 100+ P-400, and 90 P-39 had arrived in Australia. Of those 125 had been lost in Java and to accidents, 75 had been turned over to the RAAF, 74 were in repair, and 100 were awaiting assembly.

 

On 18 March there were 33 P-39, 92 P-40 and 52 P-400, 12 B-17, and 27 A-24 operational in Australia.

[John Dudek]

Not much longer than they did. One million pounds isn't that much as it is a starvation diet for one million for one day. How many people were at Bataan that had to be fed? When the surrender happened they had already eaten the cavalry horses, artillery mules, and stripped the jungle of all edible life.

 

Except that it wasn't "one million pounds". It was the entire yearly rice crop of Luzon that was stored at the Central Luzon Depot and it numbered hundreds of millions of tons, not pounds. I just re-checked the number in Morton's Book "The Fall of the Philipppines."

[John Dudek]

From a quick glance at Craven and Cate I find:

18 P-40 and 52 A-24 arrived in Australia on 22 December, but missing trigger motors and solenoids for the A-24 and Prestone for the P-40.

 

14 B-17 made it from Del Monte to Darwin in January.

 

By January plans were in place for the “early transfer” of 80 HB, 114 MB, and 480 P to Australia and the NEI. 3 B-17 were to leave 24 December, 3 more on 25 December and then at a rate of 6 per day. It was anticipated that 55 P would arrive by 8 January and an additional 125 by 18 January.

 

By 6 January 20 B-17 and 6 LB-30 were en route, 45 B-17 and 9 LB-30 were being prepared. Eventually 66 B-17 and 15 LB-30 were sent by the early overseas routes, arriving in Australia and Java, the rest were diverted, mostly to India.

 

By 25 January 112 P-40 had arrived in Australia and 160 more by 4 February.

 

By 18 March a total of 337 P-40, 100+ P-400, and 90 P-39 had arrived in Australia. Of those 125 had been lost in Java and to accidents, 75 had been turned over to the RAAF, 74 were in repair, and 100 were awaiting assembly.

 

On 18 March there were 33 P-39, 92 P-40 and 52 P-400, 12 B-17, and 27 A-24 operational in Australia.

 

Here's some information about the "Pensacola Convoy" that was diverted to Australia and arriving there on 22 December, rather than proceding to MacArthur's Forces in the PI.

 

The seven vessels were the Holbrook, Republic, Meigs, Bloemfontein, Admiral Halstead, Farmer, and Chaumont. The vessels carried a field artillery brigade with 20 75-mm. guns; the ground elements of the 7th Heavy Bombardment Group; 18 P-40s; and 52 A-24s, 500,000 rounds of .50-caliber armor-piercing and tracter ammunition; 9.600 rounds of high explosive for 37-mm. antiaircraft guns; 2,000 500-pound and 3,000 30-poiund bombs; and miscellaneous vehicles and equipment. The total number of U.S. troops aboard 2as 4,600. Rad, Marshall to MacArthur, No. 776, 12 Dec 41, WPD 4628.

[Rich]

Here's some information about the "Pensacola Convoy" that was diverted to Australia and arriving there on 22 December, rather than proceding to MacArthur's Forces in the PI.

 

The seven vessels were the Holbrook, Republic, Meigs, Bloemfontein, Admiral Halstead, Farmer, and Chaumont. The vessels carried a field artillery brigade with 20 75-mm. guns; the ground elements of the 7th Heavy Bombardment Group; 18 P-40s; and 52 A-24s, 500,000 rounds of .50-caliber armor-piercing and tracter ammunition; 9.600 rounds of high explosive for 37-mm. antiaircraft guns; 2,000 500-pound and 3,000 30-poiund bombs; and miscellaneous vehicles and equipment. The total number of U.S. troops aboard 2as 4,600. Rad, Marshall to MacArthur, No. 776, 12 Dec 41, WPD 4628.

 

Yep, that matches Craven and cate exactly.

[swerve]

Except that it wasn't "one million pounds". It was the entire yearly rice crop of Luzon that was stored at the Central Luzon Depot and it numbered hundreds of millions of tons, not pounds. I just re-checked the number in Morton's Book "The Fall of the Philipppines."

 

Not hundreds of millions of tons. Total 2006 world rice crop was a bit over 400 million tons, Philippines about 11 million.

[Yama]

As for "1st Line Fighters," there damn sure weren't any P-39s in FEAF, and I doubt the whole Air Corps had 503 P-9s and P-40s operational by April Fool's Day.

 

There's your answer!

 

Anyways, as you kinda suggested, maybe the number is "official strength", what we in Finland called "ministry strength". IOW, not all those planes which were in MoD records existed anymore, owing to bureaucratic inertia. "Official" number of planes was always around 20 to 30% greater than actual field strength of flight regiments.

[Rich]

Anyways, as you kinda suggested, maybe the number is "official strength", what we in Finland called "ministry strength". IOW, not all those planes which were in MoD records existed anymore, owing to bureaucratic inertia. "Official" number of planes was always around 20 to 30% greater than actual field strength of flight regiments.

 

Oh well, so much for my original idea. I finally tracked down the meaning of "1st Line" and "2nd Line".

 

Airplane, first-line, one suited to perform the mission for which it was originally intended.

 

Airplane, second-line, one no longer considered operational due to such factors as age and obsolescence.

 

The evidence is that the 1st Line strength in fact includes both operational and non-operational aircraft, just look at March, where we have separate figures similar to those in the Statistical Digest, but where many of those are in repair.

 

So the second-line heavy bombers must be either B-17 or LB-30 and amy actually be the "aging" B-17 evacuated from the Philippines?

[John Dudek]

I agree that the mishandling of the campaign was amateurish at best and almost downright criminal.

 

OK, there's an active garrison on Bataan and therefore the forts across Manila Bay are probably intact. Now you have the US forces sitting on the bullseye for every Japanese aviator who needs bombing practice. Our ability to supply them with decent fighters would be negated, so no air cover and a dwindling supply of AA ammo means that Bataan is the new live-fire training area for Japanese bomber crews. Further having 40-80,000 troops stuck out there certainly mean that the US will bend every effort to relieve them. Knowing where your enemy is heading for certainly beats having to garrison and patrol the entire Pacific. Would it have been several small battles of supply/reinforcement convoys eating up the available US naval strength or would we have fallen for the "one big battle" that the Japanese planned and trained for? Either scenario puts the US in a poor naval position by late 1942-early 43. Instead of the new ships of 1943-44 reinforcing survivors of the Solomons battles, they are needed to replace the ships lost in trying to break through to the PI.

 

Just one path of thought.

 

Strangely enough, one of the few things that MacArthur's men did not run out of during the siege was 3"-75mm AA ammunition. US Submarines ran the blockade a number of times to bring in brand new, mechanically fuzed AA ammunition to Corregidor that increased the blast ceiling range of the guns high enough that Japanese Aircraft had to fly at a much higher and less accurate bombing altitude to avoid being hit. This was to continue until the closing days of the campaign.

[JOE BRENNAN]

So the second-line heavy bombers must be either B-17 or LB-30 and amy actually be the "aging" B-17 evacuated from the Philippines?

As mentioned above, two of the 3 'second line' line FEAF heavy bombers March 1 would have been 40-3097 and 40-2072, the other 40-3079, all among the 19th BG’s original outfit of B-17C/D’s from the Philippines, which were removed from frontline status during February per 19th BG’s report quoted in Salecker “Fortress Against the Sun”. In mid February 40-3066 of PI contingent was also still around, but destroyed on the ground Feb 22. 3079 was lost in accident in March so 3 ‘second line’ by April 1 likely included a B-17E dropped to that status. (the other survivor of the PI contingent at the time, 40-3095, was being restored to flying condition by the Japanese).

 

For general info of other readers, parts of the USAAF Official History by Craven and Cates, including vol 1, with the a/c strengths in Australia you quoted, are available online: http://ibiblio.org/hyperwar/AAF/

 

To clarify P-40's lost in 'pipeline' or captured, the Langley carried 32 when sunk. The Sea Witch was a modern C-2 type cargo ship, diesel variant, serving as US Army Transport. She delivered 27 crated P-40E's to Java successfully Feb 27, and escaped (survived WWII). Craven and Cates gives a US account implying the a/c were pushed into Tjilatjap harbor in their crates. A Dutch website says they were in the process of assembly and some had been test flown before Java capitulated March 8, but were again supposed to have been destroyed to prevent capture.

http://home.hetnet.nl/~tornij1/P40.htm

 

Several accounts have suggested the Japanese might have recovered some but AFAIK there’s no specific info. In fact a book specifically about aircraft captured by the Japanese, “Japanese Army Captured Aircraft Secret Files” (日本軍鹵獲機秘錄), has many details not seen elsewhere but doesn’t mention that. Besides the two P-40E’s captured intact on Mindanao (details and first hand US accounts given in “Doomed at the Start” by Bartsch) the book also shows a picture of derelict P-40's at a Java airfield at least one of which could easily have been returned to flying status, plus a photo of a flying example captured in DEI. It mentions however only 4 flyable Japanese P-40’s up to mid 1942. It also describes the P-40 detachment in the 50th Sentai in Burma in 1943, saying it was equipped with 4 P-40E’s, described as a/c captured in the PI, so whether exactly the same 4 actually from PI/DEI is not clear. Besides accidentally shooting down a Japanese bomber, that unit accomplished little due to poor serviceability and lack of spare parts. Later the book describes around 5 P-40’s of various model captured in China, including N’s later in the war. The j-aircraft site below has some of the same info as the book from other sources.

http://www.j-aircraft.com/captured/capture...aptured_p40.htm

3 captured P-40E's, B-17D 40-3095, and a Dutch Buffalo, Japan, 1942

 

Joe

Edited March 4, 2008 by JOE BRENNAN

[Rich]

For general info of other readers, parts of the USAAF Official History by Craven and Cates, including vol 1, with the a/c strengths in Australia you quoted, are available online: http://ibiblio.org/hyperwar/AAF/

 

Thanks Joe for the clarification. But for yours and the other readers information, all of Craven and Cate, along with quite a bit of other material of interest, is available through the Air Force History Support Office at:

 

http://www.airforcehistory.hq.af.mil/index.htm

 

Much other Air Force History material, including a substantial part of the von Rohden collection on the Luftwaffe is available at AFHRA:

 

http://afhra.maxwell.af.mil/

 

although they are migrating to a new site.

 

Enjoy.