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CHINA
NATIONAL AVIATION CORPORATION : |
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The
aircrews and transport aircraft of the China National Aviation Corporation
played a vital role in the victory of Allied forces in the Second World
War. Established as a
national airline in 1929 in order toopen up China to air travel. CNAC was originally a partnership between the Chinese
Government and the Curtiss-Wright Aircraft Corporation,however,
Curtiss-Wright was soon replaced in the partnership by Pan American
Airways. Shortly
before Chennault's AVG began operations against the Japanese, CNAC had
pioneered a number of air routes over the forbidding Himalayan Mountains
in order to connect China and India by air.
These newly explored high altitude air routes would soon be known
throughout the world as the "Hump," and would play a major role in the
ultimate defeat of Japan's Imperial war machine. With
the fall of Burma and the closure of the "Burma Road," in April 1942,
the Japanese Army had effectively cut-off China's last remaining land
route to the outside world. The
loss of the “Burma Road," left the Allies with no alternative but to
supply China entirely by air. By
immediately utilizing the Himalayan air routes they had first charted in
1940, CNAC crews began what would become the most physically challenging,
and ultimately the most successful military airlift operation in history. By
first working with the few US Army transport aircraft that were available
to supply both Chennault's aerial operations and the Chinese military,
and then as an intricate part of the Army's Air Transport Command, CNAC
aircrews would operate in support of Allied operations throughout the
entire China-Burma-India Theater of Operations. However it would be over the high altitude air route known as the
"Hump" that CNAC aircrews would contribute most to Allied victory and
at the same time, create for themselves a legendary record of achievement
that is unmatched in aviation history. CNAC crews made more
than 38,000 war-time trips over the "Hump," and would carry more than
114,500 tons of vital military equipment and supplies to American, Chinese
and British forces throughout China and Burma. |
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