A Story of War

Not much hope of getting to India, it seems. Now as a sop to the army and the Chinese we are to do reccos again. Rikki and two others patrolling Loiwing above 10/10 cloud runs out of petrol, gets lost and all prang. Yesterday Navy ‘O’s over Loiwing at 6am and ground strafe 28 a/c to their heart’s content – ie until all their ammo gone. Result 5 damaged. At 15.30 yesterday 9 Navy ‘0’s up there, 6 shot down by AVG, 1 by 17 sqn, 1 of 17 sqn bales out, another crashes into a mountain, the engine rolls off and the pilot gets two black eyes.

I go out shooting with my .38 yesterday and wound a vulture. On returning, Pierce says we have a recco each to do. I am to fly to Heho for night and recco Chinese front by Bowlake. He will fly to Meiktila and next morning recco Allanmyo front. But after yesterday at Loiwing, only one Hurricane left, so he is using that today, and I shall do mine when he comes back.

Then when 17 sqn have their second Hurricane serviceable, we shall have it and do reccos. Burma’s total air effort. Nothing to do here but read books and walk out occasionally in the woods. Some gin and some sherry in the mess. Air raid alerts twice a day lasting for about two hours.