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AMERICAN
VOLUNTEER GROUP "THE FLYING TIGERS": |
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The
Curtiss Hawk 81-A-2 of
American Volunteer Group fighter ace, Robert T. "R.T."
Smith.
The aircraft carries the red fuselage band and "Hell's
Angels" insignia of the A.V.G.'s Third Pursuit Squadron,
flying out of Kunming,
China in the early summer of 1942. The Hawk 81-A-2 was the export
version of the
American Army Air Corps' P-40B Tomahawk..(Image by Jim Laurier) |
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A Curtiss P-40E Kittyhawk of the American Volunteer Group. The aircraft is one of the small number of better armed and more powerful Kittyhawk fighters that slowly began to reinforce the A.V.G. in the final days of March 1942. This particular Kittyhawk was the personal aircraft of AVG Vice Squadron Leader Edward F. Rector at Kweilin, China in the early summer of 1942. (Image by Jim Laurier) |
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ACCOMPLISHMENTS
OF THE A.V.G. The
American Volunteer Group "The Flying Tigers," fought non-stop for
seven months in the skies above China, Burma, Thailand and French
Indochina. They have been
officially credited with the destruction of 298 Japanese aircraft and
are estimated to have destroyed at least another 150, unofficially. Four AVG pilots were killed in air combat and six by
anti-aircraft fire. Three
were killed by Japanese bombs on the ground, and three were taken
prisoner. Ten others were
killed in aircraft accidents. The AVG lost twelve P-40's in combat and sixty-one on the
ground. Percentage
wise, it is an aerial
combat record that has never been equaled.
It is conservatively estimated that in aerial combat, the AVG
killed at least 1,500 Japanese pilots, navigators, aerial gunners and
bombardiers. Perhaps
the greatest single achievement of the AVG, was with only a handful of
their P-40 fighters, the AVG alone, halted and then shattered a Japanese
invasion of southwestern China at the Salween River Gorge. For their ferocious defense of the skies above China, the AVG would be honored by the people of China with the title of "The Flying Tigers." As the "Flying Tigers," Chennault and his AVG would become the most famous group of military airmen in history. |
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