← Harold's Old Time Radio
Harold's Old Time Radio
Wings To Victory 43-09-02 Great Air Battle At Wewak, New Guinea
00:32:38
Wings To Victory 43-09-02 Great Air Battle At Wewak, New Guinea
Loading summary
Transcript1 lines
- [00:05]
Narrator
From the west coast, ladies and gentlemen, the Army Air Forces present Wings to Victory, a dramatization of American heroism based on combat reports from the fighting fronts. Uncle Sam presents Wings to Victory. Do you hear those singing voices, America? They belong to just a few of the thousands of pilots, navigators, bombardiers and gunners being trained for you by the Army Air Forces. And you can depend on this, America. When they've completed their training, they'll be the finest flying fighting men in all the world. Attention. Mr. And Mrs. John Jones, USA the story of the great air battle at Wiwok, New guinea, in which The Japanese lost 317 planes and more than 2,000 air personnel. And how your Army Air Forces avenged the massacres at Hickam and Clarkey's of the war. MacArthur's American and Australian ground troops were closing in on Salamaua. The Jap was desperate. He had already lost heavily in ships and planes trying to defend Munda. To the south, on new George Island, 350 miles to the north of Salamawa at We Walk, he had four good airfields. In a final effort to save face, Tojo strategists decided to mass a dangerous force of bombers and fighters at We Walk. Secretly assembled, this force could strike with overwhelming effect at the Yanks and Aussies who had tightened a ring around Salamawa. It was a slick scheme, but it went wrong because the Yanks and Aussies were on their toes. Al Falchable's the name. A blinking sergeant in the blooming Sydney Rifles. I am the BRA sets at Molesby. Heard about the Wingate show in Burma, so they sends us out on reconnaissance patrol. See how close you can get to. We Walk, he says. So they drops us off a transport 200 miles north of Salamawa in Jap country. So me and my cobber, Corporal George Milligan, is slogging through the bush with the detail strung out beyond. I takes a dismal view of this, Al. The first month is the hardest, George. We work north of WeWork already 15 miles more. It'll be a fair dinkum job, it will. Fair dinkum, my eye. We'll wind up in a Jap prison camp. There now you see enemy aircraft. Details hold. Take cover. Hey, they'll have a squad out. Not a chance, Cobb. But I say now, three, four, five big flights of Harps and Oscars. They're coming in from the sea. What all it reinforcements. They must have flown them in from the Celebes. Extra petrol tanks on their wings and they're all headed for We Walk? What are they, you? Some military judgment cobbler? The jumps are getting ready for a big show. There they go, right down to them. We walk fields. I still says. What of it? We use a wireless, that's what. Go on, go fetch it. Wireless? This close to wewalk, you're balmy. They'll get a fix on us and wipe us out. Who's in command of this detail? You are. And it's a bloody, blinking blasted, nasty shine. But I'll fetch the wireless, Sergeant. You bloody well better, Corporal. There's one thing. You can't kill a corporal any deader than a sergeant. So what of it? Anytime I get the chance to do the Japs dirty, I can't wait. They tied my own brother up at Hong Kong. Hands and feet. Then they slaughter them in a ditch. My name is Plaisted. Captain John H. Placed it. I'm an Air Force intelligence officer attached to our headquarters in New Guinea. The reports on We Walk cleared through me, and I had the word of a sub skipper and an Aussie patrol to corroborate other information. So I went in to see our general. Good morning, Jack. Good morning, sir. Have you had time to read my memo? Just finished it. Looks like the Japs are cooking quite a thing at Wiwot. Yes, sir. They've sneaked in at least 400 new planes. That many? Well, I've averaged nine reports, sir. Maybe we ought to take some pictures, eh? Well, it clinched the case, all right, but I wish you wouldn't, sir. You see, RECCO planes would tip them off, and we purposely neglected a walk, hoping they'd do just what they've done. You want to jump them cold? They jumped us cold a couple of times. I'd like to see them hit just once without warning. So would I. But we're involved at Salamara, and I don't know what General MacArthur would say to you, sir. He'd love it. He knows that every man down here has been dreaming of a chance like this. All right, I'll ask him. Today, sir. Every minute's an added risk. Okay, Jack. I'll get right on it. Thank you, General. You know why I was so eager in there talking to the old man? Because I'd walked across Hickam Field that Sunday morning. They'd picked up the wounded, but not the dead. And our planes were still burning. And I saw three boys I had dinner with the night before. I still see him. I'm Lieutenant Richard S. Houston of Amarillo, Texas. I was bombardier navigator of a B26. The killer diller. But major dykes, our flight surgeon, grounded me. Said my nerves were in bad condition. He wanted me to tell him what was riding me, but I wouldn't. That was one thing I couldn't talk about. But Major Dykes cornered me in my tent that morning. Hey, Ricky. Oh, good morning, sir. Is this a private gloom session or can I sit in? Help yourself, Major. Thanks. Cigarette? You told me to lay off for a while. Oh, so I did. So I did. Go ahead, tell me. The skipper's gonna ship me home. Ship you? No, nothing of the sort. What gave you that idea? When a man's grounded, that comes next. Ricky, I want to tell you something in confidence. Yes, sir. The general knows a place where 400 JAP planes are sitting on the ground. So do I. Where? Tokyo. No, no. This one is a whole lot closer, Ricky. No kidding. Close enough for us. Yep, and the Japs don't know we know it. Maybe tomorrow morning every plane in New guinea will drop in on them. Shoot a stocky. You're just trying to torment a guy. Don't tell me it's gonna be a real low level straight with guns and fragmentation bombs. Don't do that to me. You'd like that, eh? A man would die happy seeing it. Let alone getting a whack at it his own self. Look, Doc, we better not discuss this anymore. You got the rank on me and my want to go on this raid. Lay off me, will you please? Lay off me. Calm down, son. Oh, yeah, sure. I get it. One of these psychological experiments and meet a guinea pig. Okay, I fell for it. Yes, I think you did. And it's worked out all right. I'm going to send you back to the Killer Diller. Send me back? Let me fly. Yep. But you should have told me about that bailout over Port Moresby. I can't remember the personal history of every man in the Air Force. And I keep forgetting that Texas boys don't like high level work. So long, son. Doggone, if Doc hadn't seen through me, he knew I'd have been eating me day and night for weeks. When a man's hung in a chute and watched Japs kill other boys all around him, he just ain't satisfied to drop bombs from 15,000ft. He wants to see him get it up close. I'm First Lieutenant Wickham Stedlo Jr. I wish to register my emphatic protest against the mental attitude which catalogs meteorologists as mere weather officers. I mean, they think weather officers view everything with cold scientific detachment. I Wanted to see the wework show a success as much as anyone. But when the general called me for a consultation. Lieutenant Steadlo reports as ordered, sir. Steadlo? I'm the weather officer in charge, sir. Major Johnson is on sick leave. Oh, oh, yes. Got your maps? Yes, sir. Good. Now, what kind of weather can you promise us for we walk first light in the morning? Weiwak, sir. One moment. Quite favorable. High pressure area is just nudging the coast. I'd say visibility is extremely good with light variable winds from the southeast. Oh, good. Lieutenant. Sir, I beg your pardon, but I don't. You weather boys have let us down. I don't want clear skies over where walk. I want a weather front moving across the Owens Tanley Mountains so we can bust out of that haze and massacre all the Japs at Wewak. Oh. Oh, I see no chance of that tomorrow morning. Oh, not the slightest, sir. But if you'd be patient, there's a dandy little storm making up over the bandage. How long do we have to wait? Well, 48 hours at least. No good. We'll have to go ahead and you're in nice clear weather. Well, couldn't you wait 30 hours? Sir, there's one other possibility I overlooked. What's that? Well, Parker, our man at Moresby, has been making a study of Owen Stanley Mountain thermals. Now, I note here in his 1400 hours report that his isobars are almost looped for the area opposite Waywell. What does that mean in plain language? Local thunderhead, sir. That could be almost as good for your purpose as a sustained cyclonic. Okay, okay, I'll settle for a local thunderhead. Can you deliver one inside of 30 hours? Well, I can answer that more positively after I've flown across that thermal belt, sir. Thermals are such tricky little scamps, kid. I want a thunderhead or a front or just a big cloud. I want it awful bad. It's a personal matter to me and lots of others in this air force. Understand? Yes, sir. That night I found the General's weather forum. I found it at 26,000ft. A beautiful force five gale was blowing into the Owen Stanley Mountains and striking thermal shafts with a 26 degree temperature variation. I knew we'd have a tidy little cyclonic storm across that mountain range by morning. I flashed my report in code, but I felt nothing personal toward the Japs at Weiwok. From a scientific point of view, the Japanese race has no sociological or cultural right claim a civilized status. Does one hate baboons for being Baboons. I'm Sergeant Pete Zabriskie of Wheeling, West Virginia. They call me a ground crew stiff, a mech, a grease ball. My outfit works for a Liberator squadron. The night before the way wax show, they rousted us out at 2300 hours. They gave us just five hours to load the guns and bomb up the squadron. We work like in a big black boiler room. Full of steam and bugs and sweat bees. Not enough light, not enough room, not enough sleep. And all of a sudden. Look up, Pete. She's fucking loose. Hold. We can't. Look out. How's the fuse? Give me that light. Is the nose pin loose? Maybe we better run. She hit pretty hard. Pete, if that fuse is jarred too much, you'll blow. No, no, I don't think anything will happen. Happen I look. No, no, it's okay. This bomb, she. She did not bump her nose wheel. That hoist. Here, you fellas. We'll put her in the bomb rack right this time. Judas. I thought we'd done it that time. Hey, Pete, what's the matter? What are you doing? I'm riding on this bomb to the Japs. Will I write for Pearl Harbor? No, on this bomb I will write for the deaths we've almost died from. Us, Pete, Bill, Solly, Ernest and Joel. And on this farm I'll write for malaria. And on this one, for being 10,000 miles from home. And on this one. Easy now, Pete. Don't blow your tongue. Stand back. On this farm, I'll write for the months I lived away from my wife. And on this one for my kids, smiles I haven't seen. And on this one, for teaching me to hate and begging you to be damned. Come on, come on. Come on, Pete. Take it easy. We'll rest a few minutes. So I went with Bill for fear they would think I'm crazy. But am I crazy? It is no good to write big words on bombs. Write little words like tears the tears our women weep and home the homes we miss so hard. Drop these words on the Japs, I say. Andrew Jackson Parks. That's me. They should have named me Steve Eight Ball Parks. I'm from Boise, Idaho. Fly a B25 Mitchell. They alerted us for the WH walk show at 2 o' clock in the morning. Intelligence officer from headquarters briefed us in the operations hut. Gentlemen, gentlemen, gentlemen. We're going to put on a little party for the Japs. At we walk, this squadron will cross the Owen Stanley's by way of Big Finger Pass. There are four airfields that we Walk your assigned targets to the one at Boreham. There should be about 150 bombers on the ground there. You'll carry fragmentation bombs for the planes and plenty of MG ammunition for personnel. We want the planes first, of course, but we hope to pile up a lot of Jap air crews as we pass by. It's our hope to leave so many dead on those fields that they'll have to be cleared off before any surviving enemy planes can use the runways. That means a thorough job of strafing. Now, before I discuss this attack in detail, I. I want to ask if there are any survivors of the Philippines or Java here. I was in both places, sir. Your name? Lieutenant Parks. Andy Parks. You a pilot? Yes, sir. Good. The name of your plane? Ms. Ferdinand. Miss. Oh, yes. Ms. Ferdinand. Well, Lieutenant, by the general's orders, your plane will lead this squadron. Yes, sir. Now then, we'll start with weather conditions. You can expect an ideal supy front at 0500 hours. If they picked me to lead the squadron, they must have wanted a lot of killing done. I was in a bad temper. The Japs sure were gonna. I'm Second Lieutenant Henry Johnson at Three Oaks, Iowa. I fly a P38. This here we walk show was to be my first combat. Skipper told me the only reason I got a chance to go was I needed every plane in New Guinea. The talk in our operations hut began to get me. I listened to the skipper and the other pilots. I told the old man it was no fair keeping us on top cover all the way through. We can strap as well as the 40s and 39s. Sure we can. Tell him, kid. Tell us. Tell the kid how it's done. Skipper. Yeah. They almost forgot Henry. Where is he? Right here, sir. Say, look, Henry, have you practiced the ground scraping? Oh, no, not much, sir. Well, it's simple. The 40s and 39s think they've got it on us because they have wing guns all yours in the nose, remember? Yes, sir. That means you've got a single hose of bullets. Now, what do you do when you sprinkle a lawn with a hose? You wiggle it from side to side. Well, he's smart. Henry's right on the. I'll pipe down, you guys. You're getting a kid confused. Now, now, look, Henry, there's just one other thing. When you catch Japs in the open, they flop and play dead. Don't let them fool you. They jerk and twitch when they're really getting into business. Yes, sir. I understand, sir. Now, if you'll excuse me, I left my Mae Weston pistol in my case. Hold your breakfast down, Henry. I never heard such. Such savage talk. I knew they were ribbing me, but it sounded awful callous. I wasn't scared exactly. Just felt sort of bewildered. Yeah, maybe I was scared, but not for myself. Not scared of being killed? Scared of killing. Gosh, I thought, that's one heck of a note. Me, a fighter pilot, scared to kill Japs. I don't know what made me do it, but I saw a light in the chaplain's tent and I walked over there. Chaplain? Mm? Oh, good morning, Lieutenant. I'd like to see you for a few minutes if you aren't too busy. Come in, son. Thanks. You're the new pilot in Squadron 3, aren't you? Yes, sir. Henry Johnson. Your first mission, eh? That's right. And Chaplain, the other fellows, well, they kind of got me mixed up. They talk so savage and bloodthirsty. Blood and guts with all the details. Yes, sir. Of course, maybe they just do it to get me down. Oh, no, they're sentimentalists, Henry. Sentimental, sir? Why, certainly. A kind hearted man always dwells with morbid emphasis on killing. Don't let those boys worry you. When they start taking slaughter for granted, then I'll start worrying. You don't think they really mean to gloat over what we got to do this morning? Are you gloating? Oh, no, sir. That's the trouble. I'm afraid I haven't enough combat spirit. Yes, that was my trouble at first, too. You, sir? But chaplains don't. We don't go into combat. Yes, sir. You're wrong, son. We do go into combat. You mustn't think of us as standing loftily in a pulpit while you boys fight. It isn't true. Even. Even the killing, chap? Yes, even the killing. Physically, we're non combatant, but that gives us no right to stand aside morally. Do you think any honest man could do that in this war? I don't know really how a minister would feel about it. Feel? Why, just as you feel, son. I have a faith in a church. You have a home and a family. Our enemies are determined to destroy them all. That's right, sir. We might have stopped this attack without war had we been wiser. You see, Japan and Germany are a disease. We fail to use preventive medicine. Now we must use surgery. Do you think ministers of Christ should watch you boys march into the operating room and turn away with pious shouts? We had no hand in this. Our hand is in this. You worked hard for peace, sir. But not hard enough, son. We thought wishing and praying would make it so. That wasn't enough. And war came. And war will keep on coming until we pitch in and do God's work for peace. Real work. Yes, sir. But just now our patient is at death's door. You see, Henry? I think so, sir. So I say to you what I say to all my boys. Boys, cut deep and let the bad blood flow. It's an ugly, filthy job, but it has to be done. And I'm with you, son. Thank you, sir. Thank you very much. God bless you, my boy. Me, I'm only a PFC in the infantry. But I know the Japs had to get it somewhere that morning because look at me and Doggo. Private Clarence Budkins of Siloam Springs, Kentucky. It was in a foxhole in the Salamau lines. The Japs had been pouring it on us all night long. They had a big loud speaker rigged in the jungle and a lousy Jap that talked good English was trying to drive us nuts. For Pete's sake. He never gonna lay off that thing. Sit tight, Doggo. Don't let him get your nanny. You afraid those Japanese guns come on and fight? Don't run away like you wait and won. Come on. But let's get that guy. Don't be a zap. They got machine guns every two feet. Well, how long we gotta take this thing? Why don't we charge them? Why don't we kill every one of those dirty rats? Listen carefully. I will now play Japanese official records of big brave Americans from Wake and Batons fighting for present camp. Okay chaps. I don't take no more of this. Darko, get down. I won't take no more. I'm gonna kill some skivvies. Let me loose. No, Doggo, it's just a trick. Wait. Here I come. You squid eyed Redmond. Get out of those homeless. Bring your whole bag of rest. Don't go. Get down foot. That's an order. But they killed my buddy. They killed him. Shut up. We'll kill plenty of them when the time comes. When is it coming? How long do we have to crawl through this stinking jungle yard by yard? They planes our planes. Pilots stay down. They're ours. They're going north. Give them hell, P. Give them hell. Yes, skipper. This soup is going to break. Just like weather said. We're almost around the mouth now. It's just 1 minute and 20 seconds to Tiger with drone. Start counting, Ricky. Yes, sir. You feel any better, kid? It's a flyer's Dream come true, Skipper. But look, we caught them. They're on the ground in rows. I see them after I've bond them. Don't forget to make another pass. I got guns to shoot. Roger. Here we go. Bombs away. Bombs away. Turn. Skip a turn. No hurry, kid. Give the other guys a chance for their bombs around us. Lousy with running jack. Turn, for gosh sake, Skipper. Okay, around we go. Lower, lower. Give me 50ft. I want to see him fall. Stay low. Skipper, I'm really gonna. Skipper, you should see him pile up. I hope all the poor dead guys they killed in the chutes are watching this. Hey, Skipper, where you going? Home, Ricky. Home? I still got bullets. Give me another pass. Well, you can't kill them all. The Liberators are coming in. We gotta make room. One more pass, Skipper. For Texas? No, but we'll buzz the hangar. I see some running in there. I'll get set. Thanks, SK. Are you satisfied, Ricky? Ain't satisfied but a shot. All my ammunition. DAG on it. B25 squadron from Lieutenant Parks. This is Forum Field, dead ahead. Take echelon to left at 500ft. Attention all bombardiers. All those Nakajimas in the middle lane have crews aboard and are starting to move. Drop your bombs with 50 yard leads. Let them run in to the burst gunners. Stand by the strength. Here we go. See flight. See flight. Turn left and take that dispersal role Now. Come on, gang, with the guns this time. What's that? Black Battery. Joe. Yeah? I don't get. Tell the old man. You better cancel my leave. Lieutenant Johnson from squadron Leader. Yes, sir. Move up to Gwyn with the first element if you like. We walk. Won't look so messy as it's going to look later. Thanks, sir, but I'll keep my regular place. Okay, Henry. Squadron three. Squadron three. All pilots, our turn. Let's go. Roger. Are those things, man? Those little things darting in between the smash planes. Is that a slit trench? Scrawly line pointing toward Tokyo. They're jumping in. They're huggling. I can see the rising sun on their backs. This fire and smoke. Oh, God, must I do this? Even the Japs. Cut deep, son, and let the bad blood flow. It's an ugly, filthy job, but it's gotta be done. Where's my gun Button? I've got it. Switch on. Air Force Command at a base. Saving you, sir. Finally. Report to General MacArthur that the waywack action is a complete success. We've smashed four airfields catching the enemy on the ground. He's lost more than 500 planes destroyed, many others damaged. 2500 would be a moderate estimate of his dead. They're lying in windrows on the air drones. Nothing I saw in Hawaii or the Philippines was equal to the death and destruction we have dealt the Japanese today. That's all. The day of Pearl harbor is, as our president has said, a day that shall live in infamy. But the men of the army air forces have made it a day of horror to the Japanese. Was the dawn red that December 7, JAP sailors and airmen saw a redder dawn at Midway. A fiercer noontide caught them in the coral sea. A deadlier twilight appalled them in the Bismarck sea. Wattle canal, cooler gulf, Rendova, Kiska, Wewak were grim hours for the Jap, time has stopped. For them, each day is Pearl harbor day. They must live that day Again and again, 10 Japs have died beneath our guns. For every second of it, a hundred, a thousand more shall die. Each minute of that day, the hourglasses of Japan were filled with sand. Now they trickle hard clots of blood. The shadows lengthen and night falls across the Japanese islands. But for these treacherous sons of Hirohito, it is still the night of December 7, 1941. All fateful, haunting, eradicable days. Let them spin the hands of all their clocks, tear the pages off all their calendars. It is still Pearl harbor day in Japan. The flames from hickam field advance across 4,000 miles of water. They light the emperor's garden in Tokyo. The torment of Manila is growling thunder above Kobe and Yokohama. Yes, for the Japanese, will this day never end? Fires. You know the answer. It will end when the Japanese empire is dead. But until the dawn when murder is requited and treachery avenged. Kill Japs. Kill them as the long red seconds tick. For to every man of us also it is steel. Pearl harbor day. Wherever we are, wherever we fly, we lift our wings from those sand fields of ambush and carnage. We keep in our hearts that righteous, that holy indignation which the blood of brothers foully slain must always demand of brave and honest men. It you have been listening to wings to victory, an official presentation of the army air forces. For obvious reasons, the names of characters in these stories are fictitious. The script was produced by William t. Johnson. Sergeant Hal Gibney speaking. This war service program comes to you each week from the west coast. And now an important message from your government. One, two, three, four, four freedoms. That's what we're fighting for. Freedom of speech and worship. Freedom from want. And fear. It's the reason our husbands and fathers and sweethearts are fighting all over the world. And to wage that fight for us, the men and women at home, we've got to buy the bonds so they can do the job. We must dig deeper and deeper into our salaries and thus materially declare our faith in the four freedoms as a way of life. We on the home front are not asked to give our lives, but only to give up a few luxuries, a few comforts. Make what you already have due homes and furnishings and clothes. Use them carefully and avoid waste or expensive repairs. That money belongs in war bonds. If you're investing 10% of your wages in war bonds, then increase to 15 or 20. Join a payroll savings pan. For freedom's sake, buy Barnes. This is the Blue Network. We hope that you've enjoyed this recording and for more happy listening, please visit otrcat.com.