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  • German V-Weapons: Desperate Measures

    "I am informed by the Fuhrer for the first time that the big rocket bomb weighs 14 tons. This, of course, is a devastating murder weapon. I suspect that when the first projectiles plunge down into London, the English public will panic."- Josef Goebbels, Nazi propaganda minister"The employment of

  • Northern Italy in 1945: The Noose Tightens

    By 1945, Allied bombing efforts began concentrating on cutting German transportation and supply lines in northern Italy to slow retreating Germans and to assist the Allied armies slowly advancing against the Germans. The number of antiaircraft guns (flak) defending these areas pointed to the

  • AAF Aerial Supremacy

    With suitable bomber targets becoming increasingly scarce, the AAF instituted a program in February for its fighters to cover Germany at low level, strafing targets of opportunity. Because of a shortage of pilots and fuel, the Luftwaffe usually held its own fighters on the ground except for

  • Cadet Issue Dress Coat

    Cadet issue dress coat which the donor had made into an Eisenhower-style jacket. He began pilot training with the Royal Canadian Air Force in 1941, but returned to the U.S. and volunteered for glider pilot school. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant and earned the service pilot wings. He was

  • Glider Pilot Casualties

    Glider pilots suffered heavy combat losses as did the pilots of tow planes and the airborne troops which the gliders carried. They were towed in flimsy, noisy, unarmed, fabric-covered gliders at about 130 mph at the end of a 300-foot, 1-inch nylon rope in air made turbulent by the tow planes. They

  • Glider Pilots in Combat

    During the March 1945 airborne crossing of Germany's Rhine River, about 40 pilots from the 435th Troop Carrier Group defended a crossroad against several hundred infantrymen and two tanks in what was called "The Battle of Burp Gun Corner." Glider pilots had the reputation of being cocky and tough

  • Glider Pilot Training

    Training time varied but consisted of daylight flying in light aircraft practicing unpowered gliding and "dead stick" landings; day and night flying in training gliders, unpowered light aircraft or sailplanes; advanced training in CG-4A combat gliders; and finally tactical training. Most graduates

  • Glider Pilots: Silent Wings

    The success of German glider-borne forces early in World War II catapulted the Air Corps into a glider program in February 1941. Glider pilots were unique in that they had no parachutes, no motors and no second chances. In December 1941, plans called for training 1,000 AAF glider pilots, but

  • Cushman Airborne Scooter

    In the late stages of the war in Europe, Allied paratroopers used scooters like this one to maintain contact between units, increase their mobility and haul small loads. The Cushman Motor Works designed the Model 53 Airborne Scooter to be airdropped by parachute or carried by glider, and it had a

  • Maj. Glenn Miller Army Air Force Band

    In September 1942, Glenn Miller, one of America's greatest dance band leaders of the period, disbanded his orchestra so he could join the Army Air Forces to do his part for the war effort. Within a year, he organized and perfected what has been widely accepted as the greatest aggregation of dance