The Flying Tigers In Defence of Rangoon
Whilst the Pacific War was in its opening weeks, the war in China was also continuing. In Chungking, the irrepressible former US Army pilot, Claire Lee Chennault, was preparing to throw into battle his newly created air force of foreign volunteers. Chennault had been requesting the creation of a new flying unit to augment the battered Republic of China Air Force, which by mid-1941 had almost ceased to exist. The Soviet Volunteer Group had fully withdrawn from China following the signing of the Soviet-Japanese Non-Aggression Pact in April 1941, and the handful of Western mercenaries who had been involved in the fighting over Chungking were too small in number and too erratic in temperament to be used as the nucleus of a new Chinese Air Force. Therefore, Chinese lobbyists began to pressure President Roosevelt to allow Chennault to recruit pilots from the ranks of the American military. In April 1941, Roosevelt allowed the creation of a volunteer unit to be sent to China.
Initially the plan was to create a force of three combat groups, the first being a fighter unit. Chennault’s recruiters were given permission to visit Army, Navy and Marine air bases in an attempt to recruit pilots to join the 1 st American Volunteer Group. Pilots were offered very high wages for the time, with generous bonuses for each enemy aircraft confirmed shot down. Any pilot agreeing to sign up was given an honourable discharge from their service arm, with the expectation that they would be allowed to re-enlist at the end of their service in China with no repercussions. The 1 st AVG eventually recruited 100 pilots and 200 ground crew, and procured 100 Curtiss P-40B Warhawk fighters from an RAF order that had lapsed. The planes and pilots were shipped to Burma, there to make their way overland to China.
Inspiración 'royal'
¿Quién? Lucía Bárcena y Marco Juncadella. ¿Dónde? Pazo de Oca, en Pontevedra. ¿Cuándo? El 24 de julio, con dos looks pura tendencia, del diseñadora Jorge Acuña. - De María Pombo a Jaime de Marichalar, reunión de influencers y aristócratas en la boda de Lucía Bárcena y Marco Juncadella
