10/30/43: The Fifteenth Air Force
The story of the Fifteenth Air Force is a very unique one for sure. Founded by Jimmy Doolittle in 1943, the mastermind of the raids on Japan by B-25 Mitchell medium bombers in 1942, it was a group of individually famous pilots that, as the Fiftenth, went unnoticed even though they had a major part in the end of Hitler's Nazi army, depriving it of precious oil to fuel its tanks, trucks and aircraft, and leading to its demise on D-Day. You may have heard of parts of the Fifteenth Air Force; The famous all-black group of fighter pilots known as the Tuskeegee Airmen, the 332nd Fighter Group, which has received more publicity than any of the five other fighter groups in the Fifteenth Air Force, which is a crime against history.
The Fifteenth Air Force operated Consolidated B-24 Liberators and Boeing B-17 Flying Fortresses, both heavy bombers, out of Foggia, Italy, and they first flew Lockheed P-38 Lightnings as fighter escorts for bombers and light ground attack, as they could carry 2x 1000 lb. bombs and had 4x Browning .50 caliber M2s and one 20mm Hispano V cannon for strafing, and then later they used Republic P-47 Thunderbolts with their huge bomb load and 8x Browning M2s, although their range wasn't great for fighter escorts, so they added the North American P-51D Mustang as a fighter escort, because it could take off with the bombers, go all the way to their target, and then fly back with them.
The Fifteenth's target was the oil fields of Polesti, Romania, an Axis country that provided Nazi Germany with the better part of their fuel. With their bombers and fighter-bombers, they completely shut off most of the supply of oil to Hitler's army, which is a major part of why Germany began to decline in power by 1944, although not many recognized the Fifteenth's role in the war at the time, because the Eighth Air Force was seen as the main threat to Germany. This acheivement by the Fifteenth did not come without a price, however, because there were many anti-air defenses on the way to Romania, and thousands of German and Romanian fighters scrambled to shoot down as many bombers as possible. The statistics are as follows:
Out of 152,542 Bomber sorties and 89,835 Fighter sorties,
The entire cost was
3,410 Aircraft Lost
14,181 Aircraft Damaged
2,703 Killed in Action
12,359 Missing in Action
2,553 Wounded in Action
Here is an excerpt from Forgotten Fifteenth by Barret Tillman, of the recounting of a Romanian Bf-109 pilot:
Twenty-five-year-old Lieutenant Ion Dobran flew one of the yellow-crossed Bf 109s that scrambled from Tecuci, near the wooded hills of Moldavia fifty miles northwest of Galati. Vectored onto the intruders by radar controller Albatross, he engaged at nearly twenty thousand feet. Dobran latched on to a Mustang and opened fire, scoring hits. But almost immediately the American’s three partners were after him. He stuffed the nose down, trying to escape in a screaming dive – generally useless against the sleek Mustang. Despite his maneuvers, one persistent Checkertail pilot stuck with him, forcing the Romanian into an emergency landing in a barley field. He opened the “coffin lid” canopy and scrambled out, expecting to be strafed. He heard only the receding sound of high—performance engine. Then silence. Dobran recalled,
“Then from inside, like a huge river, an unspeakable joy – the joy of a man who can see again the sky, the sun, and the grass. The wind is caressing me. Oh God, how beautiful is life when you start from broken pieces. We are modern gladiators – one of the two fighters should die. Who pointed the thumb up for forgiveness?”
I highly reccomend getting that book and reading it, it's a great read.
Here I will post a couple videos of P-51s and Bf-109s, so you can visualize the story the Romanian pilot told.
All videos have been previewed by me, and there is nothing innappropriate in them. Completely clean and sheltered-homeschooler friendly.
Epilogue:
The Fifteenth Air Force was established on October 30, 1943 to September 15, 1945, then was reactivated on March 31, 1946 and disestablished on March 19, 2012, and was reactivated on August 20, 2020.
Their legacy will remain in memory so long as it's preserved.
