US SOCOM

FN Unveils New 6.5mm Creedmoor Machinegun at SOFIC 2019

About a year ago, SOCOM announced that the Special Operations Forces would be upgrading their range capabilities by switching to the 6.5 mm Creedmoor caliber. This decision, the command stated, came after extensive testing.

SOCOM adopted a Barrett Sniper system that would replace their 7.62 mm sniper rifles with the 6.5 mm Creedmoor. The 6.5mm Creedmoor according to SOCOM, will double the hit probability at1,000-meters range, increases the effective range by half, reduces wind drift and has less recoil than the standard 7.62 mm.

Now at SOFIC (Special Operations Forces Industry Conference) in Tampa this week, FN America is unveiling their latest prototype machinegun to also increase their effective range as well.

According to a release by the company, the prototype FN MK 48 Mod 2 6.5CM features the latest upgrades for FN’s series of light and medium machine guns:

A new, improved saddle for mounting lasers and lights
An adjustable stock for length of pull and cheek height
Improved, locking charging handle
Improved, double-notched sear
Improved handguard with 3-, 6- and 9-o’clock positions with an improved bipod
A more robust feed tray latch, ensuring the feed tray cover locks into place during reloads.

The company released a statement that said once the development is complete, existing MK 48 Mod 1 models, chambered for 7.62mm can be configured at the armorer level to the Mod 2 variant or newest caliber with the addition of the upgrade kit and barrel conversion.

The 7.62mm version has been in use by SOCOM since 2003 and the new 6.5mm Creedmoor version has about the same recoil as a 5.56mm. However, the 7.62mm version had some drawbacks including:

Losing accuracy after prolonged firing
Overheating
Carbon build-up which led to misfires unless cleaned frequently

If you are in Tampastan this week and would like to see the newest MK 48 Mod 2 6.5CM or FN’s other military firearms, conference attendees can drop in for a visit at booth 804 at the 2019 SOFIC Conference or visit fnamerica.com.

But it looks like that Special Operations Forces are getting upgrades to their machineguns and capabilities when using both them and their sniper systems. And this is with having to carry less weight and without sustaining any more recoil. A win-win for the operators.

Photo: FN America

Special Operations Forces Selection PT Prep Week 12, Day 5

Back to the gym on Thursday morning for a Chest and Triceps workout before heading out for a 4-mile run. Look to better the standard of 32 minutes. Remember to stretch well before and after and to stay hydrated. Mark your progress down in your workout log book.

UBRR Training:

More Preparation for the UBRR:

3 x 12 Bench Press

3 x 10 Dumbbell Flies

3 x 10 Dumbbell Incline press

3 x 20 Pushups (alternate sets with wide, narrow and shoulder width)

3 x 10 ‘V’ Ups

3 x 20 Sit-ups

3 x 20 Cable Push Downs (rope)

3 x 20 Dips or until muscle failure

4-mile run (32 minutes maximum)

Stretch well after completion

Remembering MG John Frost, British Airborne Officer At Arnhem

Major General John Frost is best remembered as the battalion commander of a British airborne infantry battalion during Operation Market Garden. Frost’s battalion was part of the famous “Bridge Too Far” operation and his unit was able to capture one side of the famous and final Arnhem bridge and holding it for several days before being overwhelmed and captured by numerically superior German forces.

But Frost’s life was full of adventure from the time he was a little boy. He served with distinction throughout the Second World War and eventually retired as a Major General before passing away on this day in 1993 at the age of 80.

Childhood and Early Life:

Frost was born in India in December of 1912. His father was a Major in the British Army. According to his obituary, when he was just eight months old, his father shot a snake that was attempting to crawl in his crib. When he was just eight, he was riding a train in Baghdad, where his father was stationed and the train was attacked by men mounted on camels. While he thought it was great adventure, it was written that he took great delight in the fact that his governess was terrified.

He graduated from the British military academy at Sandhurst in September of 1932 and was assigned to the Cameronians (Scottish Rifles) Regiment. He was promoted to First Lieutenant three years later in 1935. Frost was assigned to the unit’s 1st Battalion and served in Palestine during the early stages of the Arab Revolt.

From 1938 to 1941 Frost served in Iraq and was promoted to Captain.

Early World War II Duty and Fame:

Upon returning to England during 1941, Frost was assigned coastal defense duties and was itching to get into the action. He volunteered for the Special Air Service and was sent to the Parachute Training School. After completing his required jumps, Frost was assigned to the new 2nd Parachute Battalion of the Parachute Brigade and given command of C Company.

Frost’s men were given the job of parachuting into the northern French coastal town of Bruneval and destroy a German radar installation there. They conducted “Operation Biting” flawlessly on February 27-28, 1942. The troops jumped in, took down the radar installation and brought back parts of the radar and were successfully exfiltrated by boat on the coast. They captured a German technician who was able to inform the British on the German advances of radar technology. Frost was decorated by Winston Churchill with the Military Cross for his actions there.

During the fighting in North Africa, Frost now the acting battalion commander was ordered to attack a Tunisian airfield and destroy the aircraft there. When his troops arrived, however, they found no aircraft but heavy German armor. In the ensuing melee, Frost’s men were able to get away but suffered heavy casualties, 16 officers and 250 men were lost. Frost was awarded the Distinguished Service Order for that action.

Frost with the remainder of the 1st Parachute Brigade took part in the invasion of Sicily where the troops, like their American counterparts, were hopelessly scattered and forced to attack their targets piecemeal, and later in Italy, part of the 1st British Airborne Division.

Operation Market Garden:

After the invasion of Normandy, the Allies broke out of the hedgerows and began to push the Germans back across France. Field Marshall Montgomery proposed a bold, ambitious plan to knock the Germans out of the war by the end of 1942.

The Allies would lay an “airborne carpet” of paratroopers and seize several bridges over the Waal, Maas, and Lower Rhine Rivers. Then the British XXX Corps under General Horrocks would travel quickly thru the Dutch countryside, across the bridges and into Germany where they would invade the German Ruhr industrial area and cease the ability of them to supply the German war machine.

The intelligence was faulty from the start. Originally thought to be inhabited by “old men and boys”, Holland was, in fact, the exact spot that the Germans sent their SS Panzer units, battered in Normandy, to rest and refit. This development was later thought to be have been kept deliberately from the lightly armed paratroop units.

Frost’s battalion was to be the spearhead of the British 1st Airborne Division, commanded by Roy Urquhart. They were to take the final bridges at Arnhem over the Rhine. But due to antiaircraft positions near the bridges, the RAF was forced to land the British eight miles away. Their dropzones located in Oosterbeek would prove to be a major issue as they’d lose the critical element of surprise.

Still, the prevailing thought from the Allied side was unbridled optimism. Frost was so sure of quick success, he had his Batman pack his shotgun and golf clubs.

The Allied paratroopers landed in Holland on a beautiful Sunday in daylight hours without a cloud in the sky. Frost’s battalion landed without opposition but in moving thru Oosterbeek, they were slowed by thousands of Dutch civilians who came out in jubilation that they’d been delivered, it seemed from the German grasp. Soon, however, Frost and all of the men in the airborne carpet came to realize that the intelligence estimates were wrong. The airborne troops were encountering much stiffer resistance than was thought to be in place.

Just before dusk, the British paras of Frost’s battalion reached the southern end of the bridge and established a headquarters in buildings beside the bridge. Frost sent a force to take the opposite end but they ran into a pillbox and armored vehicles. The British paras knocked the pillbox with flamethrowers but more German vehicles stopped their advance cold.

Early the next morning the British were shocked to see an armored element of the 9th SS Panzer Division, which attacked the bridge. The British troops held but infantry on both sides of the river began taking a toll on the lightly armed paratroopers. German prisoners compounded the desperateness of the situation by telling the Brits that they were with the 2nd SS Panzer Corps which was placed in Holland.

Frost was an inspiration to his men, moving between positions, and encouraging them as their casualties mounted while ammunition, food, and water ran low. The Germans sent heavy armor across the bridge but the British anti-tank gunners stopped them once again. Despite their bravery, Frost’s men were cut off and isolated at the bridge from the rest of the division. They were in increasingly desperate fighting around Oosterbeek.

Frost was then wounded in both legs. His men held on for another day but then were nearly completely out of ammunition. German tank shells had set fire to the building. His battalion surgeon told him that they couldn’t douse the fires and the 200 wounded men in the cellar would likely burn to death. Which is when Frost requested a truce with the Germans and they surrendered.

The SS then helped the British evacuate their casualties. Frost spent the remainder of the war in a POW Camp until he was freed by American troops. He was awarded a bar to his DSO for his bravery at Arnhem.

Postwar Years:

Frost resumed command of the 2nd Parachute Battalion which was stationed in Palestine. He later attended the Staff College and was made a General Staff Officer (GSO 2) with the 52nd Lowland Division.

He served in Malaya in 1950 as a GSO 1 with the 17th Gurkha Division. He later commanded the 4th Airborne Brigade. He retired in 1968 as a Major General. During his time in Palestine in 1946, he met his future wife and they had two children.

During the filming of “A Bridge Too Far”, Frost served as a technical adviser and was portrayed on the screen by Anthony Hopkins. The bridge over the Rhine at Arnhem was renamed John Frostbrug (“John Frost Bridge”) in his honor in 1978.

Frost passed away on May 21, 1993, at the age of 80 and was buried at Milland Cemetery in West Sussex.

Photo: British Archives

10th Special Forces Group Troops Parachute into Normandy

Seventy-five years ago, thousands of American and British paratroops were waiting on the go-ahead to begin the airborne assault on Normandy during World War II. The airborne assault on Hitler’s Fortress Europe was expected to be a very bloody affair for the airborne troops which were expected to suffer grievous casualties in the opening days of the invasion.

The airborne troops would fare much better than expected but the Normandy hedgerows proved to be a terrible obstacle and the troops ended up in the line much longer than anticipated as the days after the invasion proved to be bloodier than was originally expected.

On Saturday, as part of the on-going 75th-anniversary celebration for the invasion to free the French people from Nazi rule, some 135 American Special Forces troops jumped into Normandy. Soldiers from the 10th Special Forces Group jumped into the area surrounding Mont Saint-Michel from aircraft flown by the 352nd Special Operations Wing and the 86th Airlift Wing.

The town nearby Avaranches was one of the keys to the allied breakout from Normandy during Operation Cobra in late July 1944. The town turned out to greet the Special Forces troops who then laid a wreath at the monument dedicated to General George S. Patton Jr. and then had a ceremonial toast with the mayor.

The Special Forces troops were celebrating the and recalling the Jedburgh teams of OSS (Office of Strategic Services) which are the direct forefathers of both the Army Special Forces Groups and CIA. Jedburgh teams or “Jeds” as they were known back then, consisted of three-man teams dropped behind enemy lines to train, equip and advise local resistance groups.

It is fitting that the Special Operations community used the backdrop of Mont Saint-Michel to jump into Normandy. Back in 1944, one Special Operations trooper captured the abbey and town by himself.

In the summer of 1940, the Germans overran France and they took the abbey the day before the French government capitulated. They put up observers in the spire of the abbey which dominated the surrounding area. German troops were billeted in the town and they trained nearby for what was supposed to be “Operation Sea Lion”, the invasion of Britain.

But after the Battle of Britain, Operation Sea Lion was canceled and the Germans then changed their focus on holding onto their territory. They began to place fortifications all along the coast. In the area nearby they put up “Rommel asparagus” long poles with mines attached to the top to disable landing craft if they tried to pull up on the beach. Because of this, they banned fishing anywhere close to the coastline, putting more bad tidings upon the French citizens.

After D-Day, the Germans were fighting all along the Normandy coastline. And as the Allies finally began to push the Germans back after 6-7 weeks of intense fighting, they were streaming into the town as they retreated.

As Operation Cobra, was getting underway, troops streaming into the continent were part of Patton’s 3rd Army. They were the fresh troops who would become operational and do the open field running for the American Army once they punched a hole in the German lines.

On July 30, the newly arrived 4th Armored Division struck a critical blow, capturing the town of Avranches, effectively cutting off any retreat for German troops to the east and south of there. The American 6th Armored Division pushed westward toward Pontorson which was pinning the Germans along the coast.

Patton knew Pontorson well, having gone there with his wife before the first world war. He mentioned the town in his diary. On August 1, Third Army became operational and the breakout commenced with tremendous speed. Patton’s troops broke into the enemy rear and began to rout the Germans as they overran Brittany and pushed westward.

But a lonely private would make a big contribution to the effort. Private Freeman Brougher of the 72nd Psychological Operations Bn. was in a jeep with two war correspondents, one American and one British.

They raced down the open roads and were approaching the abbey when they stopped to ask directions from a French civilian. At first, the man was distrustful but once he realized that Brougher was not one of the hated Germans but an American soldier that all changed. The French people were delirious with joy. And the word quickly spread.

“They sprang from nowhere,” one of the war correspondents remembered. “No sooner did the magic words go around, ‘Les Americans,’ than folks came running from every direction.” By the time they reached the abbey, The small jeep had added two priests, three women, a fireman, and several other local citizens.

The Germans inside the abbey were exhausted and had nowhere to run, they surrendered to the lone private. The jubilant Frenchmen then took Brougher to the mayor’s house where he toasted with champagne, decked out in flowers and carried on the crowd’s shoulders where he was asked to sign the Town’s Golden Book, which records the list of the local nobility. Soon other Americans would arrive and Brougher would happily load up some prisoners on his jeep and get back into the war.

Brougher survived the war and would return to his life in Pennsylvania. He married and had two children and would return with them to Mont Saint-Michel in 1987 to show his family where his service took him and to revisit with the French people. His two children said he was called the “savior of Mont Saint-Michel.” Brougher passed away in 2003.

More can found on the freeing of Mont-Saint Michel here:

Photos: DVIDs, US Army

Special Operations Forces Selection PT Preparation Week 12, Day 3

Tuesday is our Leg Day at the gym followed by a 4-mile run. Begin with pull-ups, then squats, lunges and the sled push followed by a four-mile run in under 32 minutes.

These exercises will build up leg power, strength, and endurance that will serve you well in SOF. These muscles all help in carrying the heavy rucksacks that you will be toting in Special Operations. The key here is more reps and lighter weight (for the most part).

UBRR Training:

Continue to prep for the UBRR

3 x Pullups 10 reps or to muscle failure

3 x 12 Leg Extensions

3 x Squat 20-15-12 reps (lighter weight)

3 x Goblet Squats 20-15-12 reps (lighter weight)

4 x Sled push (with a heavier weight) or Fireman’s Carry with a training partner

3 x 10 reps Dumbbell Lunges

3 x 20 Spider-Man Planks

4-Mile run (32 minutes maximum)

Stretch well after completion

Catch-22 Comes Close But Doesn’t Quite Stick the Landing

George Clooney takes on Joseph Heller’s dark, satirical novel that he penned in 1961, starring in it, directing two of the series six episodes and producing it as well. Trying to reproduce Catch-22 is no easy feat although the insanity of war and the weird characters that war produces lend itself well to the insanity we see on a daily basis today.

Unlike the novel, and the 1970 film that was directed by Mike Nichols, Clooney and his writers take on a more linear approach and play the events in more chronological order, something Heller himself disapproved of. In an interview he did with Rolling Stone back in the day, he said: “Put the events in chronological order, and you’ll find an uneventful story about a bombardier and a colonel who wants his men to fly more missions than anyone else.”

The problem with it is, like many adaptations, if you have read the book and remember it well, then you’ll be on the fence with it. Filmed mainly in Italy, where Clooney reportedly spends much of his time, the cinematography has a sepia-toned, dusty feel for the B-25 bases during the war.

The cast is excellent. Clooney as the mugging General Scheisskopf (Shithead) who rises from Lieutenant to Lieutenant General is a perfect foil. Kyle Chandler is outstanding as Colonel Cathcart, the tough-talking, an often idiotic commander who keeps raising mission-counts to buck for a promotion. Martin Balsam played the role brilliantly in the 1970 version. But if anything Chandler outdoes him. Hugh Laurie (House), and Daniel David Stewart as the uber-capitalist Milo Minderbinder, who is out to make a profit and doesn’t care where, whether it be from the Allied side or even the Germans. It was a not-so-subtle jab at firms like Haliburton et al in today’s world.

But the film revolves around Yossarian, the bombardier who’s only mission of note is to get out of the war at any price. He’s expertly played by Christopher Abbott. Yossarian takes everything about the war personally and his only way is to complete his mission total. But with the rising mission counts frustrating him, he seeks to plead insanity in a war gone insane that is run by lunatics straight out of the insane asylum.

But, says the camp doctor Daneeka, who delivers his lines like a military Groucho Marx, played well by Grant Heslov, who also directed two of the episodes there is a catch….Catch-22.

“Catch-22. Anyone who wants to get out of combat isn’t really crazy, so I can’t ground him,” says Daneeka.

“Ok, let me see if I’ve got this straight,” asks Yossarian. “In order to be grounded, I’ve got to be crazy. And I must be crazy to keep flying. But if I ask to be grounded, that means I’m not crazy anymore, and I have to keep flying.”

“You got it, that’s Catch-22,” says Daneeka. “Whoo… That’s some catch, that Catch-22,” Yossarian says… “It’s the best there is,” deadpans Doc Daneeka adds.

Giancarlo Giannini is perfectly cast as the old Italian pimp where the horny GIs like to spend as much time as possible. His lines, as a survivor of Italy’s long list of glorious losses in war, are perfectly delivered.

The bombing runs where Yossarian has a non-obstructed, first-hand view of the war, are something that is both beautiful and terrifying. One of my bucket list things to do was to fly in the nose (bombardier position) of a B-17. Of course, flying there in wartime is a very different proposition.

And every time Yossarian flies another mission, it takes a little piece of his own sanity with it. The officers who are insistent on sending the pilots up in the sky full of death are immune to both their suffering and the horrors of it, safely remaining on the ground. And while their bombastic aura of dealing with subordinates is tough sounding, they show their true colors when dealing with superiors of their own.

While satire is often hard to capture on the small screen, the funny lines are often too drawn out and could have benefitted from more snappy timing.

This series with the insanity that is war and the larger insanity of those behind it will lend itself well to the current events as the United States, already in endless wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, while still actively engaged in Syria and elsewhere is rattling its saber with Iran, Venezuela, North Korea and elsewhere.

Hulu, which released “Catch-22” on Friday, is taking aim at both Netflix and Amazon Prime with their original productions put out a worthy effort here. You will enjoy it without being wowed. It is good, because of the stellar cast but just misses hitting it out of the park.

Photo: Hulu

Special Operations Forces Selection PT Preparation Week 12, Day 2

A Monday morning pre-test of the Upper Body Round Robin (UBRR) with many of the exercises that will be tested. A few years ago, I spoke with a veteran NFL player about passing their conditioning test prior to starting the annual summer training camps. He said, “the only way to pass it, is to prepare for it and practice it.”

So, we’ll practice our UBRR and if you can pass this, the PT Tests at the beginning of Selection will be a piece of cake. Always go for perfect form, most especially when doing the pushups, it will be an area that is always looked at hard during the PT tests in Selection.

After the exercises, a three-mile run as fast as you can. Mark the time in your workout logbook. Remember the time limit on the run is 24 minutes maximum. Go thru the entire list of exercises, take a two-minute break for water and then go for the run.

UBRR Training:

More preparation for the UBRR

1 x 1-minute Pushups

1 x 1-minute Sit-ups

1 x 1-minute, Crunches

1 x 1-minute, V-ups

1 x Dips as many as possible to muscle failure

1 x Pullups as many as possible or to muscle failure

3-mile run (24 minutes maximum)

Stretch well after completion

Special Operations Forces Selection PT Preparation Week 12, Day 1

It is time for our Sunday morning Rucksack march. Do a quick warmup of pushups and sit-ups before heading out for 8 miles. Head out over varied terrain and try to go as fast as you can without running. The standard is 120 minutes, maximum. Your goal should be to come in much quicker.

Stretch well both before and after the event. Remember to drink plenty of water and stay hydrated out there. Break it up by wearing your second pair of boots today to ensure they are properly broken in for the course.

Training:

Warm up

2 x 20 Pushups

2 x 20 Sit-ups

8-mile Rucksack march over varied terrain with a rucksack weighing 45-pounds minimum, and in 120 minutes (2 hours) or less. And mark your times in your workout log book.

Stretch well after completion

Special Operations Forces Selection PT Preparation Week 11, Day 7

Back in the gym this Saturday morning for a shoulder and back workout. Pull-ups, Deadlifts, Side Raises, and Shoulder Presses. Followed by a four-mile run in 32 minutes or less. Log your numbers down in the workout notebook and stretch well.

Training:

More Preparation for the UBRR:

3 x 10 Lat Pulldowns, rear

3 x 10 Barbell Dead Lift

3 x 10 Wide Grip Pull-ups

3 x 10 Dumbbell Side Raises

3 x 10 Seated Bent-Over Delt Raise

3 x 10 Dumbbell Shoulder Press

3 x 10 Arnold Dumbbell Press

4-mile run (32-minutes maximum)

Stretch well after completion.

May 17, 1943, the Memphis Belle Flies Her 25th and Final Combat Mission

The “Memphis Belle” a B-17F Flying Fortress of the Eighth Air Force would become the most famous of the 12,750 B-17s produced by Boeing during World War II. The plane and her crew would become immortalized, first by the Army who filmed her crew for a documentary prior to a War Bond tour and later by Hollywood who made a fictionalized feature film on the exploits of her crew.

The casualty rates were so high, that the United States put a 25-mission limit on crews. If a crew flew 25 combat missions and survived, they were rotated back to the states. But none of the crews were surviving that long. The Memphis Belle was one of the first to do so.

Background:

The air war for the United States in 1942 and early 1943 was a bloody affair. The United States had entered the war just months before, and Britain decided to pressure the German war machine by bombing it around the clock. The British would bomb at night, the Americans by day.

The Allies didn’t yet have fighters that had the range to escort the bombers to their targets and back. The German Luftwaffe was a formidable adversary with very experienced fighter crews. The German anti-aircraft artillery which they called “Flak” was accurate and plentiful.

In the early days of daylight bombing, the Germans exacted a terrible toll on the new American formations. Casualty rates were appalling. It was here that Captain Robert Morgan and his crew would step into the war.

B-17F 10-BO, manufacturer’s serial number 3470, USAAC Serial No. 41-24485, was added to the USAAF inventory on July 15, 1942, and delivered in September 1942 to the 91st Bombardment Group at Dow Field, Bangor, Maine. The aircraft was deployed to Prestwick, Scotland, on September 30, 1942, and stationed at a temporary base at RAF Kimbolton on October 1, and then finally to her permanent base at RAF Bassingbourn, England, on the 14th of October.

The marking on the sides of the fuselage bore the unit and aircraft identification markings of a B-17 of the 324th Bomb Squadron (Heavy); the squadron code “DF” and individual aircraft letter “A.”

Morgan decided to name the plane after his sweetheart back home, a woman named Margaret Polk from Memphis, TN. Originally the plane would be named after Morgan’s nickname for Polk, which was “Little One” but after he and co-pilot Jim Vennis saw a film where the main character had a riverboat named the “Memphis Belle”, the name stuck. Morgan brought it up to the crew and they voted for it.

The drawing on the fuselage was from a pinup by artist George Petty that was in Esquire magazine in April of 1941 issue. Corporal Tony Starcer, copied the Petty girl pinup on both sides of the forward fuselage, depicting her bathing suit in blue on the aircraft’s port side and in red on the starboard. The Memphis Belle was born.

Air War Over Europe:

Morgan and his crew flew their first mission over Europe on November 7, 1942, at Brest, France. The command of the American Air Forces and the Pentagon set the incentive of 25 missions for crews to reach to be rotated back to the United States. But no one was reaching that threshold. Casualties among the bomber crews in those early dark days were at 80 percent.

In interviews much later, Morgan summed up the horror of the early days of the airwar in describing the awful casualties suffered by American aircrews in the first days of the bombing campaign.

“Eighty-percent losses means you have breakfast with 10 men and dinner with only two of them.”

Memphis Belle had her share of difficult scrapes with German fighter planes and flak and on five different occasions had an engine shot out. Another time, a diving German Focke Wulf Fw-190 came straight at the plane and riddled the tail with holes setting it on fire. After the fire was out, Morgan climbed back into the tail to survey the damage.

His comments, captured by History.net tell of the difficulty he had in bringing the ship back safely. “It looked like we had no tail at all,” Morgan said. “I got back in the cockpit and flew back to the base in two hours. It was tough flying, and tougher than that to set her down. The elevators were damaged so badly that the controls jammed. Somehow we managed to get down safely.”

The American bomb groups were taking on tough, well-defended targets including the Focke Wulf plant at Bremen, locks and submarine pens at St. Nazaire and Brest, docks and shipbuilding installations at Wilhelmshaven, railroad yards at Rouen, submarine pens and powerhouses at Lorient and aircraft factories at Antwerp.

During her 25 missions, Memphis Belle gunners were credited with shooting down eight German fighters with another five probable kills. They damaged 12 more fighters and dropped over 60 tons of bombs on the German war machine.

After their 25th mission, the crew which had been the subject of a war documentary by Hollywood director William Wyler, the crew was rotated home on a 31-city war bond tour. The men were treated as heroes wherever they stopped. Only one female was ever allowed to fly with the Belle. Stuka, a Scottish terrier bought by co-pilot Jim Vennis in England accompanied the crew and was spoiled with the rest of the crew.

Memphis Belle crew, pilot Robert Morgan (5th from left)

One of the stops was in Memphis where Polk was in attendance, although interestingly enough the two never did marry but did remain life-long friends. Morgan put on a stunt at his own hometown of Asheville, NC where he flew the Fortress down the main drag in town and turned it between two large buildings on its side.

General Henry “Hap” Arnold, gave Morgan the choice of any assignment he wanted. He chose to transition to B-29 bombers and bomb the Japanese. He took part in the first raid on Tokyo in November of 1944. After flying 50 missions he was sent home for good. He remained in the Air Force and retired as a Colonel.

Memphis Belle Not the First to Complete 25 Missions:

Unlike the feature film that came out in 1990, the Belle was not the first plane to fly 25 missions in Europe. That distinction belonged to Captain Irl Baldwin of the 303rd Bomb Group and the plane “Hell’s Angels” named after a Howard Hughes, Jean Harlow film from back in the day. Baldwin completed his 25 missions a week before Morgan did. Memphis Belle was the first to complete 25 missions and return to the United States. Baldwin and his crew would go on to fly 48 missions before returning to the U.S. for their own bond tour in 1944.

I met Baldwin at the Mighty Eighth Air Force Museum in Savannah, GA a few years before he passed away. And in talking to him, you got a great sense of how difficult life was for those bomber crews over Europe.

Asked which was worse, the fighters or flak he smiled and answered…”Yes!” He said, “it didn’t matter how large the group was when those German fighters were coming head-on into the group, you’d swear to God every one of them was firing at you.”

He added, “Once they’d open up it looked like they were winking at you and the next thing was those cannon shells ripping past.”

Irl Baldwin and the ground crew of Hell’s Angels

I asked how he managed to survive 48 missions where so many didn’t last long at all.

“Some of it is pure luck,” he said. “There is nothing you can do about flak and those German gunners were good. They’d get your range and it looked like you could walk from burst to burst with touching thin air.”

“But the other thing we learned right away was that we had to be better pilots. The only way we could survive the fighters was fly wingtip to wingtip. That way all of our guns could be trained as one. If the Germans could get in between the bombers of the group, and they were some great pilots, they’d cut you to pieces.”

Baldwin too transitioned to B-29s after his War Bond tour. But he never got the chance to fly in combat over Japan. “Right after I got there, we dropped the bomb,” he said with a shrug. “I got there a few days too late.”

Asked why he’d volunteer after already flying so many combat missions, he shrugged again. “We were at war and I felt I was better suited for it than other guys.”

“Besides,” he added, “ I figured the Germans were the best we’d go against. If they couldn’t get me I didn’t think the Japs could.”

Photos: US Archives