Wings of Love and War

  This is the story of Bobby, a young man who grew up in southern California, interested in hot rods, flying, and girls.

  Joining up just after Pearl Harbor, he was finally called up for Aviation Cadet training with the Army Air Force in 1943. A promising pilot, he washed out in Basic due to airsickness.

  Appalled by the wholesale deaths of civilians in the massive nighttime bombing raids by the Nazis and the RAF, he became dedicated to the AAF's doctrine of precision daylight bombing of military targets. For that reason, he finished Cadet training as a bombardier.

  After checking out in B-17s, he flew in a new B-17G to England with his crew, assigned to the 568th Squadron, 390th Bomb Group at Station 153 near Framlingham, northeast of London. Further training then led to combat missions over Nazi Germany, always hampered by the ubiquitous cloud cover and freezing weather. In 1944-45 the worst weather in almost a century beset Europe, making it almost impossible to bomb visually. After much agonizing over the likelihood that his bombs were killing innocent women and children, he and his crew were selected and trained for lead, using the H2X radar units that were then being installed in place of the ball turrets.

  The radar fell short of his expectations, leading to persisting frustration, not banished by a final mission when bombing was entirely visual.

 Flak-plagued missions were interspersed with romantic interludes in London, and later, in between missions, after he had become the lead bombardier of the 568th, near, and even on, the Base itself.

  The climax is when the 390th is involved in one of the greatest battles of the air war, the first time in months the Group had encountered enemy fighters.