Official United States Army Air Forces Photographs
World War II

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1.      Two B-25s churn the water with hits and near misses on a Japanese frigate in the March 29, 1945, attack which cost the Japs nine ships. South China Sea.

2.      Theatre No. 15-North Africa-B-25s of the U. S. Army Air Forces in North Africa.

3.      Wewak, N. E. Dagua, New Guinea-A preview of the ultimate doomsday at Dagua is this Fifth Air Force minimum altitude, attack on a Jap air strip eight miles west of Wewak on 3 February. The leading B-25 (left) unloads parafrags on three Tonys, while other parafrags pepper the strip. Notice the dim B-25 at upper left. At right, a B-25 cuts through dense smoke from a burning Helen.

4.      North Africa-Like elephants in a circus parade the P-47s are trundled through the streets of the North African port city to the airport, while native children and adults enjoy the show.

5.      B-29 BOMBS OVER BURMA-Tons of bombs speckle the sky over Rangoon, Burma, as they spew from tile yawning bomb bays of Twentieth Bomber Command Superfortresses. The target of this daylight attack by Brig. Gen. Roger M. Ramey's India-based airmen was a large Japanese supply depot near the Mingaladon Air Field near Rangoon. Returning flyers declared it a "perfect mission" from the standpoint of weather and observed results of bombs on the target.

6.      Theatre No. 15-Ferryville Harbor, Tunisia-Bombs from B-17 "Flying Fortresses" over Ferryville Harbor. Tunisia, April 4, 1943.

7.      FLAMING B-24-These are the last moments of a B-24 Liberator Bomber of the U.S.A,F. It is part of a squadron engaged in a raid on an industrial target in Austria. Enemy fighters came up in force, downing all bombers except the one from which this photograph was made. At least five enemy fighters were destroyed.

8.      HAVOC ABOVE AND BELOW. An A-20 Havoc of the U. S. Army Fifth Air Force flies away from the havoc it has just wrought on an oil storage tank at Boela on the Island of Ceram, Netherlands East Indies.

9.      Theatre No. 23-Southwest Pacific--It's D-day in the South Pacific and this photo depicts a momentary junction of American air and sea forces on the move. The B-25s are enroute for Rabaul to blast Jap airdromes while the invasion convoy, several thousand feet below. spreads toward the Green Islands. Capt. Bachmann, A.A.F. staff correspondent in the South Pacific, snapped this picture from one of the bombers.

10.    B-17 Flying Fortresses of the Fifteenth Air Force make their way toward their base amidst numerous flak bursts after attacking the Schwechat Oil Refinery at Vienna, Austria, on September 10, 1944.

11.    Austria-Target, hits, and bombers-they're all plainly in the picture-made while a formation of B-17 Flying Fortresses of the U. S. Army Fifteenth Air Force dropped a deadly load of bombs on the important Nazi aircraft factory at Weiner Neustadt, south of Vienna, Austria. Returning crews reported good coverage of the target. an important production for Messerschmitt single engined fighter planes.

12.    P-38 Lightnings over France.

13.    CLOSEUP OF A FLAK TOWER-Disregarding the hazards involved, a U. S. Eighth A.A.F. fighter plane (P-47) can be seen here swooping in on a flak tower on a German airdrome in occupied France recently. This picture taken from the motion picture gun camera record of the American plane following, shows the hazardous type of action encountered when strafing at such a low level. Bursts can be seen striking the tower as the American fighter pilot roars perilously close to the tower in his attack.

14.    DRUM BOMBS-Seven of the 55-gallon drum fire bombs released by U. S. Army Seventh Air Force just above Airstrip No.2 on Iwo Jima on February 1, 1945, head for the wooded area near the boat basin where the invasion took place. Chemical officers recommended heavy strikes of several thousand of the drum bombs to prelude the Iwo invasion. The bombs are fitted with ply- wood fins designed to take the place of unavailable metal fins.

15.    SO LONG SALLY-This generously camouflaged Jap Sally plane went up in smoke a few seconds after this photo was taken-destroyed by the parafrag bombs which are seen just before they hit. This is the work of the U. S. Army Fifth Air Force during a low-level bombing and strafing attack on Old Namlea Airdrome, Boeroe Island. Note other bombs in background.

16.    ANOTHER ATTACK ON SINGAPORE-B-29 Super- fortresses of Brig. Gen. Roger M. Ramey's Twentieth Bomber Command continue to wreak destruction on the important Japanese-held stronghold of Singapore. Hundreds of bombs plaster the Empire Dock, virtually wiping out the latex installations, cold storage plant, tanks, warehouses, pipe system and other primary facilities within the area. Huge columns of black smoke, reaching 10,000 feet in the air, are rising from burning buildings and materials, while a column of white smoke represents an ineffectual effort on the part of the enemy to put up a smoke screen to hide the vital targets.

17.    View of the U. S. paratroop landing in New Guinea. Below and to the right of the leading plane may be seen several parachutes in various stages of opening, swinging the men at extreme angles and very close to the ground.

18.    Completing 250 combat missions is quite a record and here the Liberandos--the bombers of the 376th Heavy Bombardment Group of the Ninth Air Force-head over the Alps for the "target for tonight." Based in North Africa, and later in southern Italy, the Liberandos have been on missions as far north as Augsburg, Germany.

19.    Parachute bombs falling on Clark Field In the Philip- pines during the week that preceded Gen. MacArthur's landing on Luzon on January 9, 1945.

20.    Pilot, while flying a B-24 Liberator of the Fifteenth Air Force based in Italy, on a pin-point bombing mission to destroy a bridge in Yugoslavia, received direct flak burst In the waist section forward. The shell did not explode until it hit tile roof inside the bomber. Upon exploding, it ripped open the waist, wiped out both waist guns, and severed the rudder control cables. One crew member was killed by flak. The pilot brought the plane in on her engines on]y, due to his controls being out. This photo shows crew members as they change into their ground clothing just after the plane landed.

21.    B-29 Superfortresses in flight.

22.    DUREN RECEIVES ITS QUOTA-Little remains of Duren, Germany, situated on the right bank of the Roer River, halfway between Aachen and Cologne, after saturation bombing.

23.    Here is a view of Hiroshima, Japan, showing total destruction resulting from dropping of the first atom bomb. August 6, 1945.

24.    BUILDING B-29 BASES IX CHINA by U.S.A.A.F. aviation engineers and native 1aborers. Landing strips were constructed on rice field and paddles, bought from Chinese farmers. Then the farmers themselves and neighboring townspeople pitched in to do the work. Each village contributed its quota of RO many men, mules, wheelbarrows, carts, implements. The laborers came from as far as 150 miles away--on foot. Chinese workers with wheelbarrows and primitive shoulder-carrier baskets are creating a turning circle at the end of a run- way.

25.    BUILDING B-29 BASES IN CHINA by U.S.A.A.F. aviation engineers and native laborers. A water-pump literally manned by manpower.

26.    P-38 FORMATION-A formation of P-38s buzzes the field as the fighter planes return to their base in Italy after escorting heavy bombers over Austria, to help ward off enemy interceptors. These planes, part of Maj. Gen. Nathan F. Twining's U. S. Army Fifteenth Air Force, are the oldest fighter group in the A.A.F.

27.    Four U. S. Army Eighth Air Force B-24 Liberators hit Tours, France. Photo catches them at instant of release of bombs. Smoke markers were used, one of which may be seen in the background, with another rising like a plumed serpent at right.

28.    ATTACK ON JAP CONVOY OFF KA VIENG, New Ireland, by the Far East Air Forces on February 16, 1944. Shown here is a bomb "straddle" on a Jap patrol boat. The cargo vessel in the background received a fatal hit.

29.    Theatre No. 22--Nauru Island--Jap-held Nauru Island just after it was hit by heavy Army Air Force Liberator Bombers. Smoke and dust can be seen rising high above demolished Jap installations as an American Liberator Bomber swings away from the target and heads for home.

30.    A Japanese phosphorous bomb explodes beneath B-29s of Maj. Gen. Curtis E. LeMays, Twenty-first Bomber Command, during a recent mission over Kagamigahara, Japan, site of a huge air depot approximately 30 miles north of Nagoya. Two large plants of the Kawasaki and Mitsubishi Aircraft Companies are located here. Phosphorous bombs such as seen in this picture may be fired from ground batteries or dropped from enemy aircraft in air-to-air bombing attempts to break up B-29 formations.

31.    THE LUFTWAFFE COMING UP-IN SMOKE-More than a dozen columns caused by burning German aircraft destroyed on the ground give graphic emphasis to the new record set on April 16, 1945, by U. S. Eighth Air Force fighter pilots--644 enemy planes destroyed on the ground, three in the air. On April 10, 1945, the 339th Fighter Group set a new Eighth Air Force group record by destroying 105 parked aircraft. April 16, that figure was topped three times-- the 78th Group destroyed 127, the 339th reported 116, and the 353rd reported 110. The planes destroyed on the ground included a wide variety of types which were found on airdromes and dispersed in adjacent wooded areas throughout a broad area extending from Munich to Prague. Some anti-aircraft fire was encountered. This picture was made by an automatic camera mounted on a P-51 Mustang.

32.    Six men met instant death in the accident which left this Fifteenth Air Force B-24 Liberator Bomber balanced squarely on her crushed nose. An accidental application of brakes during take off on a mission is thought to have caused the freak accident. At the time this picture was taken, rescue crews had not been able to reach the bodies of the crewmen in the nose. Italy.

33.    A heavily armed six-engine ME-323 being shot down off Cape Corse, Corsica, by a B-26 Marauder of the Air Force.

34.    Nagasaki, Japan, under atomic bomb attack.

35.    Greece--British paratroopers landing on an airfield near Athens. Note Greeks running to greet tl1em. They were brought in by planes of the Fifty-first Troop Carrier Wing, U.S.A.A.F., veterans of every show in the Mediterranean Theatre and the Burma fighting. After the Fifty-first landed British paratroopers and glider-borne Infantry, they landed at an airfield in the Peloponessu", where they picked up tons of supplies and brought them into the starving Athenians.

36.    Winging over the remains of an ancient Roman aqueduct these Flying Fortresses, of the U. S. Army Fifteenth Air Force, are on their way to bomb Nazi Installations In Italy. While only piles of rubble remain of some portions of the aqueduct, proud pillars stand at other places, defying the ravages of time and the element". Rome, Italy.

37.    OVETURNED LIBERATOR-Bombs tumble from the bays of an overturned Liberator Bomber, of Maj. Gen. Nathan F. Twining's Fifteenth Air Force, when the plane I" caught in a heavy flak belt as it makes its bomb run over Blechhammer, Germany. Crew members were unaccounted for.

38.    LIBERATOR OVER ITALY-After bombing in support of the Eighth Army drive in northern Italy, this B-24 Liberator, of the U. S. Army Fifteenth Air Force, has been hit by flak and the force of the explosion has crumpled the wing. The big plane caught fire and plunged into the ground. Two men bailed out of the burning plane.

39.    "Off we go"--The Army Air Corps song was never more appropriate than here as a B-25 medium bomber soars off the flight deck of the U.S.S. Hornet enroute to Tokyo, t Yokohama and other Rising Sun industrial centers to give the Japanese their first taste of bombs dropping on their soil.

40.    A Japanese destroyer escort ("frigate") under attack by B-25s of the Air Apaches Group near Amoy, China, on April 6, 1946. As the victim keels over, panicked Japs sprawl over its sides, cling to wreckage and bob in the sea.

41.    THEATRE No. 23-0ne of two B-24s hit by Jap bombs about 4 A. M., April 22, 1943.

42.    Waves of B-24 Liberators of the Fifteenth A.A.F. fly over the target area, the Concordia Vega oil refinery, Ploesti, Rumania, unmindful of bursting flak, after drop- ping their bomb loads on the oil cracking plant, on May 31, 1944, during the strongest heavy bombardment at- tack of the day. Pillars of black smoke rise from hits on the storage tank area and 011 pumping station, as well as other Installations.

43.    FRANCE--CELESTIAL PATTERNS--On their way to strike the heart of Hitler's domain-Berlin, B-17 Flying Fortresses of the U. S. Eighth Air Force leave fleecy vapor trails as they roar overhead.

44.    B-29 Superfortresses of the 73rd Bomb Wing dropping fire bombs on Japanese installations at. Yokohama, Japan, May 29, 1945.

45.    Astra Romana Refinery--This shot gives a vivid idea of how low the B-24s flew In bombing the PloestI Field.

46.    Jap "Topsy" Type MC-20 Transport burning on Selaroe Strip, Netherlands East Indies, July 22, 1944. Note Japanese running for cover.

47.    TRAILS IN THE SUB-STRATOSPHERE--Giving them the appearance of monsters from Mars, the vapor trails left by these Flying Fortresses of the U. S. Army Eighth Air Force leave their marks in the sub-stratosphere. The curved trails leading upward, were made by the fighters accompanying the B-17s on the raid. The deadly 60 cal. machine guns, bristling from the leading Fortress, are plainly visible against the light reflected from the contrails.

48.    ATC plane over Pyramids in Egypt.

49.    A crowded portion of the beach at Coney Island? No, just thousands of German prisoners of war cluttering the landscape at a POW assembly area near Bad Kreuznach, Germany. Photograph by a Ninth Air Force cameraman flying in a liaison Diane.

50.    Italy--Winging their way toward the front to bomb German troops in the Cassino area, B-25 Mitchell twin- engine bombers of the Twelfth A.A.F. pass Mt. Vesuvius as she coughs up ash and smoke thousands of feet into the air. Crew members reported the air very turbulent In this vicinity

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