The Burma Banshees

Text: Jan Bobek

Illustrations: Gareth Hector

Cat. No. 82242

Burma (today’s Myanmar) during the Second World War may have seemed like a less significant battleground. On the Allied side, however, a total of one million soldiers from several nations were eventually deployed on the Burmese front.

In 1942, the Japanese at first sought to maintain transportation links between their conquered territories in China and Burmese Rangoon (today’s Yangon). Burma was to serve as a sort of buffer zone protecting further conquered areas in Southeast Asia. Before long, however, the Japanese, supported by armed forces of various puppet regimes, began to attempt an invasion of India, which ultimately did take place, though in a limited form.

After the fall of Singapore, the British had no intention of allowing a disaster on such scale, and they exerted maximum effort to defend India and to retake Burma. During 1942 and 1943, however, they had little success on the battlefield, and stabilization did not come until 1944.

This Sisyphean task would not have been possible without the support of air units. At the beginning of the fighting in Burma, the Japanese faced only a few dozen British aircraft from No. 221 Group RAF and a small contingent of “Flying Tigers” from the legendary American Volunteer Group (AVG).

The situation gradually improved, and by the autumn of 1943, under the command of the South-East Asia Air Command led by Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Peirse, there were 48 RAF squadrons and 17 American squadrons deployed. By mid-1944, the number had increased to 64 and 28 respespectively. The primary tasks of these units were supplying ground troops, conducting bombing and ground-attack missions, providing fighter escorts, and carrying out patrol operations. Aerial reconnaissance was of course an indispensable part of operations, but aircrews were also assigned duties such as spraying insecticides to improve the living conditions of soldiers on the ground.

It may not be surprising that the British 14th Army fighting in Burma, nicknamed “The Forgotten Army,” was considered “the the most air-minded army that ever existed.”

By 1944, the Japanese Army air units in the region were already significantly weaker in numbers, and their aircraft lagged behind those of the Allies. Nevertheless, Japanese pilots remained dangerous opponents, as they mostly faced smaller, isolated engagements and did not suffer the extensive, devastating aerial battles that their naval comrades experienced around places such as Rabaul or the Marianas.

One of the American fighter units that reinforced other combat formations in the region was the 80th Fighter Group. Activated in February 1942, it arrived in India by sea in May 1943 and was assigned to the 10th Air Force. Initially it was equipped with P-40s, and in 1944 it transitioned to the P-47 Thunderbolts. One part of the 80th FG, the 459th FS, equipped with twin-engine P-38 Lightnings operated largely independently from the rest of the group and in 1945 was reassigned to the 33rd FG. If this separate squadron is excluded from the group’s tally, the core of the 80th F, consisting of the 88th, 89th, and 90th Fighter Squadrons together with group headquarters, achieved 44 confirmed aerial victories, with 4 more aircraft probably destroyed and 27 damaged.

During its operations, the 80th Fighter Group wrote off approximately three hundred P-40 and P-47 aircraft, and twelve of its pilots went missing in action. The only ace of the 80th FG flying single-engine fighters was 1st Lt. Samuel Eugene Hammer of the 90th FS, with five victories. Flying a Curtiss P-40 in March 1944, he scored two Ki-49 Helen heavy bombers, and in December of the same year he added three Ki-44 Tojo fighters while flying a Thunderbolt.

Striking white skull drawings soon appeared on the noses of the Curtiss P-40s of the 80th FG, giving the group its nickname, the “Burma Banshees.” This name was reinforced by some pilots and mechanics who mounted air-driven sirens under the aircraft, producing a characteristic wailing sound. According to Celtic legends, the banshee, a female spirit, emits a terrible ear-piercing wail.

Gareth Hector’s artwork portrays an aerial combat scene involving four pilots of the 89th FS on May 17, 1944, after they had bombed a bridge near Kamaing. They were attacked by about a dozen Ki-43s of the 204th Hikō Sentai. In the fierce dogfight, Lt. Philip R. Adair claimed two Oscars shot down, Lt. Thomas E. Rogers claimed one more and another one damaged, and Lt. Joel A. Martinez claimed two damaged. Two American aircraft were damaged and one pilot was injured, but both P-40s made it back to base. The Japanese suffered no losses and after the engagement claimed four P-40s shot down.

Lt. Philip R. Adair ended the war with three confirmed victories and three damaged aircraft to his credit. His aircraft is the one depicted on the box art.