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Aviation History
1942
1942 - 0754.PDF
336 WAR IN THE AIR and rear gunner finally succeeded in getting the better of the flames after a very critical time. Boih men showed great pluck, and one hopes that neither was badly burnt. During recent moonlight nights Fighter Command has intensified its activities over that part of Northern France which is within its range. The enemy's airfields are regularly at tacked, and often an enemy bomber is surprised, either setting out to bomb some place in Britain or coming back from a raid. Day sweeps by Fighter Command continue as a matter of course, and of late many Focke-Wulf 190 fighters have been encountered. One of our squadrons recently saw at least 30 of these machines, Germany's latest type of fighter. Our Spitfires in particular have no great respect for the F.W. 190, and have already shot down a substantial number of them. The Germans have not entirely given up night raids on Britain, though London has had a long period of quiet. On many nights a few indi vidual bombers cross the coast and drop bombs, mainly in East Anglia, but often on other places near the coast. More often than not these bombs fall in open country and do no* harm at all, but occasionally houses are destroyed and some people are killed and injured. Sometimes our fighters catch these marauders and exact the due penalty. The Pacific and Burma remain a critical centre, and there is a grim message from Chungking asserting that the Japanese in Burma have been American armourers loading 3001b. bombs on to a Boeing Fortress. using poison gas in their attacks on the Chinese forces at Toungoo. So far neither Germany nor Italy has used poison gas during this war, and it was not used in the Spanish civil war. It will be remembered that the Italians disgraced themselves by using it in their conquest of Abyssinia. Whether the Japanese have used it during their four years of fighting in China we cannot say. When used against a nation with developed chemical resources, gas is a double- edged weapon, and the Germans lost far more than they gained by introduc ing it on the Western Front in 1915. A message from Canberra says that in the last week of March the Japanese lost more than 50 aircraft. It has also been stated that on and since March 10th Australian and American air attacks had probably crippled over 10 per cent, of the total cruiser strength with which Japan entered the war. That will tell when the United Nations begin to assert themselves once more in Pacific waters. The last ten days of March saw yet another concentrated attempt by the Axis to subdue Malta. Evidently the Germans do not consider an attempt at invasion of the island on the lines
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