My guess is either the BBC writer was trying to add a bit of “Colour” to the story (admit it…how many times have you seen an English writer come to the US “In search of America” only to write about the weirdest, most colorful, Jerry Springer-type people he could find?) …or the CAF guys were having a leg pull and the writer believed it. After living in West Texas, I know those “good ol’ boys” do have a very dry sense of humour. 🙂
Well John. it has been a long time since I saw the documentary, but I watched it several times back then and my recollection is that it was actually the members themselves saying it directly during an interview – I doubt they were given a script to read by some British writer. That would be just silly. Maybe they were saying it tongue-in-cheek, I cannot recall, but my memory recalls that they were pretty serous. I hope someone here has that programme on video and can clarify my faded memories of about 15 years ago. I am happy to be corrected.
Now those Texas boys weren’t so stupid to believe that a P-51 and P-38 were going too keep America from being invaded when the entire Air Defense and Tactical Air Commands (with their countless F-102s, 104s, and Phantoms) had failed. 🙂
Why not? As you well know there are a lot of militia groups even today in the USA who don’t believe the country’s defences are adequate. Most of them are nuts who build bunkers and have more weaponry than the military, and are more dangerous than the supposed enemy. So why could a similar mentailty not apply to warbirds owners who were WWII and Korea vets and were scared witless by the endless US propaganda that the Commies were coming? It is not beyond the realms of reality, is it?
Sign In
