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Profiles In Courage: The Flying Tigers

By 1941, the Japanese Empire was fully invested in China, where it had begun a full-scale invasion in 1937. The Japanese made huge gains in the first two years of the war, occupying Manchuria and annexing it, then moving south into Beijing, Shanghai and Nanking. By 1939, China began a counterattack that only proved it wasn't capable of winning in modern combat of the time. 

Chinese troops saw some successes against the Japanese, but they were only piecemeal and not part of a greater strategy. Still, cities occupied by Japanese puppet governments continued their resistance, as many cities that had fallen under the fascist boot around the world continued their resistance. 

In the United States, people were taking notice of the spread of fascism around the world. In 1941, most Americans knew a war was coming, either against Germany, Japan, or both. One American, who had been in China advising Chinese leader Chiang Kai-Shek on his air forces since 1937, was ready for it. 

Claire Chennault, a retired U.S. Army Air Corps officer, was originally overseeing the training of Chinese pilots flying Soviet-built aircraft. But in 1940, he went to Washington to convince the Roosevelt administration to take the new Curtiss P-40B Warhawks to China. 

The Chinese were able to buy 100 Warhawks and recruit 100 volunteer pilots, 60 from the Navy and Marine Corps, and 40 more from the Army Air Forces. They also recruited 200 ground crews, all of which volunteered to fight Japanese aggression under the Chinese flag. They were paid through a military contracting company and offered a bounty for every Japanese plane shot down. 

The first 300 men of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) arrived in what was then called Rangoon in Burma (today, it's called Yangon, Myanmar) on July 28, 1941. They were on a Dutch liner traveling on civilian passports. They began by training at a British-built airbase in Burma to brush up their flying skills, learn the new plane, and -- most importantly -- learn how to fight the Japanese. 

To do this, Chennault taught them everything he knew from watching Japanese aircraft in action over China for the previous five years and from testimony provided from Soviet pilots who were already flying missions against the Japanese. Instead of chasing more agile Japanese planes into turns and trying to beat them from behind, Chennault preached a doctrine of attacking the Zero from a superior altitude while in a dive. 

When ready for another attack,  they were instructed to slash at the Japanese, then prepare for another diving attack. This was all contrary to everything they learned at American or British flight school, but everything the AVG was doing in Burma was contrary to how they were initially trained. Chennault set up the "world's best early warning system" to ensure his pilots could successfully execute the strategy.

Unfortunately, it took so long to plan and create the Flying Tigers (which was what Washington was already calling them by the time they were ready for combat) that the United States had entered World War II before they flew their first missions.

When their aircraft arrived in Burma, the P-40s were assembled, test flown and delivered to the airfield for use by the pilots. While the pilots trained, they watched newsreels and read stories about the fight against fascism elsewhere in the world. One day, they saw a picture of a Curtiss P-40 flown by the British, where they had been fighting the Germans since 1940. 

One aircraft, part of the Royal Air Force No. 112 Squadron, had a nose painted with large sharks' teeth. The AVG adopted the look, which is now associated with them today.

When the Flying Tigers were ready to take the fight to the Japanese, much of China's eastern coast was already occupied, so vital supplies, troops, and equipment had to be moved into China overland via the Burma Road. The Flying Tigers' three squadrons, 1st Squadron, the "Adam & Eves"; 2nd Squadron, the "Panda Bears," and 3rd Squadron, "Hell's Angels," watched over opposite sections of the road. 

On Dec. 20, 1941, they saw combat for the first time, as Japanese Lily bombers made their way toward the city of Kunming on the Chinese end of the Burma Road. The AVG's 1st and 2nd Squadron intercepted the bombers and forced them to jettison their loads before they reached the city. 

Five days later, heavy Japanese bombers made their way toward Rangoon itself. Fourteen fighters from the Flying Tigers flew alongside 15 British Brewster Buffalos to intercept 63 Japanese bombers and 25 Zero fighters. The RAF and the Flying Tigers down almost half of the enemy planes. 

The Flying Tigers operated in the skies over Burma and the Burma Road until July 1942. In that time, they took significant losses but always inflicted much more damage to the enemy than they took, despite only ever having 63 fighters operational at best. However, its most important contribution was winning battles for the good guys at a time when World War II seemed to be going terribly for the Allies. 

As newsreel after newsreel lamented the losses of bases on Guam, the Philippines, and Singapore, the volunteer pilots and ground crews of the Flying Tigers provided combat victories and hope that the Allies would win the war in the Pacific.