From Snow Tiger To Flying Tiger

Bit more of a discussions – yet another AVG scheme on what is supposedly a combat veteran 343FG in the Aleutians.

http://www.warbirdinformationexchange.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=51986

regards

MS

To the reporter’s credit, it’s one of the more accurate articles on the AVG in recent times. The sentence is technically correct, though perhaps needed to be better punctuated and arranged.

P-40E – flown by AVG – correct, the Salween Gorge ground attack missions in support of the retreating Allied ground forces was flown in mid-1942 by the AVG (pre-dating the 23 FG), and used a combination of the newly arrived P-40E’s with standard bomb-shackles and a number of P-40B/C’s with ad-hoc bomb attachment gear. The jury is still out on exactly what sort of “Tomahawk” or long-nosed P-40’s were issued to the AVG. They did come from the British Commission order allocation, but seemed to be some hybrid between the Tomahawk II / P-40B / P-40C in terms of fitted equipment.

1st AVG formed in China before US entry into WW2 – correct, they were training in the north of Burma (near or on the Chinese border) in the last few months of 1941. Though as you quite rightly pointed out, the AVG’s first combat missions did not occur until well after the US declaration of war.

Regards, …geoff

The aircraft, a P-40E model, is the kind flown by the 1st American Volunteer Group formed in China by Gen. Claire Chennault shortly before the United States entered the war.

I wish museums would do their research… the AVG never actually saw combat before 7 December 1941.

The AVG had its first combat on 20 December 1941, when aircraft of the 1st and 2nd squadrons intercepted 10 unescorted Kawasaki Ki-48 “Lily” bombers of the 21st Hikotai raiding Kunming.

The AVG only flew P-40Es from April 1942 on… they had only Tomahawk IIBs (diverted from RAF deliveries) and P-40Bs before that (and continued to use the older birds until they were unrepairable).