Page Four
CLOUDBUSTER
Saturday, February 19, 1944
Corsairs and Hellcats Destroy Jap
Planes at Better Than 5-to-l Ratio
The Navy’s two new fighter*^
planes—^the Vought Corsair and
the Grumman Hellcat—are com
piling fine records in the Pacific,
the Navy Department announced
last week.
The “Terrible Twins,” as they
have been dubbed by the Fleet’s
aviators, in 1943 destroyed 884
enemy warplanes, at a loss of 170,
thereby improving the five-to-one
ratio which Navy and Marine
Corps flyers have maintained since
the beginning of the war.
Making its debut in February,
1943, the Pratt and Whitney pow
ered Corsair, completed the year
with a record of 584 Jap planes
shot down or blasted to bits on the
ground. Only 108 Corsairs were
lost, with a large number of their
pilots being rescued.
The Hellcat made its bow dur
ing the carrier task force raid on
Marcus Island, Sept. 1, 1943, but
did not meet any substantial
enemy aerial opposition until the
Wake Island raid a month later.
From then until the year-end, the
Hellcat—also Pratt and Whitney-
powered—put 300 enemy craft out
of the fight. Only 62 Hellcats were
lost, and many of the pilots
rescued.
The item of enemy planes de
stroyed provides only part of the
record achieved, for in almost
every action of the current Pacific
offensive, one or the other, or both
of these six-gun, 400-mile-an-hour
fighters viciously strafed the Jap
island objectives—Marcus, Wake,
Nauru, Tarawa, the Marshalls,
Bougainville.
This strafing devastated a va
riety of installations—^barracks,
fuel and supply dumps, troop con
centrations, radio stations, troop
and supply barges.
The Corsair and Hellcat have
divided the fighter burden, the
Hellcats operating from carriers
with Navy pilots at the controls,
and the Corsairs from land bases
with, in most instances. Marine
flyers as pilots. Both, however,
can operate from either ship or
land bases.
Scores of published reports on
Hellcat and Corsair accomplish
ments give conclusive evidence
that these two planes are the an
swer to the vaunted Jap Zero.
Both planes mount six .50 cali
ber machine guns, and are capable
of top speeds above 400 miles an
hour, ceilings over 35,000 feet, and
range of over 1,500 miles.
OFFENSIVE
(Continued from page one)
available, particularly planes and
ships, for a major effort against
the Japanese. The decline of the
U-Boat menace and the virtual
elimination of the Axis navies in
Europe have made possible a great
concentration of naval strength in
the Pacific. And the use of this
strength is in line with President
Roosevelt’s policy of hitting the
enemy “everywhere at once.”
The rapid conquest ef the
Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshalls
was also a brilliant justification
for the campaign of attrition
which we haye waged in the Paci
fic for a year and a half. Neither
the Solomons nor New Guinea is of
tremendous importance in itself.
Yet these islands have served as-
battlefields on which the Japanese
have been forced to expend valu
able material of war.
The Marshalls campaign si
lenced the dire prophecies of a
tedious “island-by-island” strat
egy in the Pacific. In one bold
stroke our forces moved more than
five hundred miles from newly-
won positions in the Gilbert Is
lands. Important Jap positions at
,Wotje and Jaluit were by-passed
in favor of the dominating Kwa
jalein Atoll. The garrisons on
these lesser islands are now un
der siege by sea and air. It is
also debatable whether Wake
Island, now an important base in
the Jap air-supply system, can
hold out against pressure that can
be brought to bear upon it from
Kwajalein.
The general public always
exaggerated the significance of
Japan’s “thousands of unsinkable
aircraft carriers” as their island
bases were known. Japanese re
sources never permitted the de
fense of all their islands. If Japa
nese strategists attempt to de
fend the maximum number of is
lands they will be preparing only
the piecemeal defeat of the Im
perial forces. This policy would
scatter the defenders and make a
concentration of the attackers
even more effective. Not every
island is important, either for the
enemy or for us. The criterion of
an island’s value is its useful
ness as an air base. We are con
quering islands only that our air
power may be brought nearer the
heart of Japan’s empire.
To these strategic conclusions
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may be added some observations
on tactics. The loss of fewer than
three hundred men in the Mar
shalls makes it clear that am
phibious attacks are not neces
sarily bloody. New methods of
combining naval shelling with
aerial bombardment have smashed
even the most skillfully designed
gun emplacements.
To the naval theorists of an
older school the use of battleships
to silence shore batteries is a mod
ern anachronism. Moreover, bat
tleships have been operating with
in sight of shore in “narrow
waters” and within range of
“shore-based aircraft: a harrow
ing situation for a ship according
to some military commentators!
Our amphibious operations in
the Marshalls have again tested
the carrier-warship team. In these
task forces the utility of escort
carriers (CVE’S) has been
proved, and the mutual support
that air and sea power afford one
another has been amply demon
strated. Planes from the CVE’S
have enabled a successful defense
to be combined with terrific offen
sive power. Carrier operations in
1942 it will be recalled had the
latter without the former. Final
ly it may be remarked that the ab
sence of a naval defense force in
the Marsfcalls offers some proof
for the belief that the main Japa
nese fleet will not dispute the com
mand of the sea.
SURVEY
(Continued from page one)
provide commanding officers with
complete data on enlisted men
when they are being assigned so
that the latter may be used most
effectively, and to facilitate a
checkup on those already in per
manent complements to determine
whether they are placed where
they can do the best possible job
for the Navy.
Willard B. Stay, CY, USN
(Ret.), a veteran of 29 years of
naval service, was in charge of
the classification specialists here
who included Harry A. Coker,
Sp(C)2c, William M. Farrell,
Sp(C)2c, Ralph R. Harberts,
Sp(C)3c, William C. McCamant,
Sp(C)3c, and Gordon Hayslip,
Sp(C)2c, all USNR.
Violin Concert Monday
Benno Rabinof, noted violinist,
will present a concert in Memorial
Hall next Monday starting at
2030. Included on his prograifl
will be “Rondo in G Major” by
Mozart, “Ave Maria” by Schubert,
“Caprice No. 24” by Paganini, and
Wieniawski’s “Concerto No. 2 in
D Minor.” The concert is pre
sented under the auspices of Phi
Mu Alpha Sinfonia, national hon-
orary music fraternity, to replen-
ish the scholarship fund.