Post by Deleted on Aug 8, 2011 11:28:35 GMT 8
Hey Dmether....The list goes on. I dug up another ancient publication from my junk, titled "Fall of the Philippines" by Ward Rutherford, It is one of series of Softback booklets, by Ballantine's Illustrated History of the Violent Century. This little publication has the photo of the B-18s that we have already discussed, but this time the aircraft are incorrectly labeled as American bombers attacking Japanese troops in the Lingayen area. Of course, we know the pic is from maneuvers/exercises prior to the outbreak of hostilities. Another photo dipicts a B-25 attacking Japanese landing craft in Lingayen. No B-25s were used in repelling any Japanese landings to my knowledge. Seems that I have read that late in the campaign, maybe, a few B-25s (flown up from down south NEI or Australia) staged out of Del Monte for some type of mission to disrupt Japanese operations in the Visayans. I may be hallucinating on this latter point. My main point here is to show that some of these publications will use any photo in attempts to convey what their text is saying. I just wish that the shots they choose to use were a bit more authetic,etc. Always enjoy your contributions. Cheers.
You are correct Okla! The only B-25 Medium Bombers used in the Philippines in 1941 or 42 was during the Royce Raid around the same time that Bataan fell to the Japanese. The bombers were indeed flown in from Australia along with three B-17's to Del Monte on Mindanao. They flew three days worth of bombing missions in and around Luzon in the forlorn hope of temporarily raising the Japanese naval blockade in order to run in some badly needed food and supply ships to Bataan, but it was a case of too little, too late.