The B-25 Mitchell in
the USSR
Aleksandr Akvilyanov,
translated by James F. Gebhardt
No
one can better describe events than someone who was a witness and
actual participant. In the process of gathering information
concerning the combat employment of the B-25 in ADD [long-range
aviation], one of the authors of Mir Aviatsii — V. M. Ratkin — had
at his disposal the recollections of a participant in the receipt of
and familiarization with these bombers, Guards Major General of
Engineers A. M. Akvilyanov. This is the first publication of these
recollections in English translated by James F. Gebhardt with kind
permission of Mir Aviatsii.
The first four B-25s,
which crews from NII [Scientific Research Institute] and
Headquarters VVS had flown in from Basra, Iraq, were at Kratovo
airfield [1].
Several men from these crews had been in the USA, where they had
participated in a compressed period of study of the B-25 aircraft at
its production facilities. Among them were pilot Lieutenant Colonel
Romanov, navigator Lieutenant Colonel Molchanov, and flight engineer
Captain Zebin, all of whom were assigned to commensurate positions
in our division [2]
for the purposes of assisting our flight crews and maintenance
personnel in their transition to the B-25.
The 37th BAP (Bomber
Aviation Regiment) of Siberians, which was the first regiment in the
222d BAD, had also just arrived and was stationed at this same
airfield. The commander of this regiment was Lieutenant Colonel
Katarzhin, the senior regiment engineer was Major of Technical
Services Ya. P. Pristup, the deputy senior engineer was I. S.
Petrov, the engineer for ESO (special electrical equipment) was
Captain Beskorovannyy, and the engineer for armaments was Captain of
Technical Services Poprushko. It should be noted that this regiment
was a solid organization, a cohesive collective that carried out its
military duty in an exceptional manner. It had later been designated
the 13th Guards Red Banner Roslavl Regiment.
The ferry crews
quickly familiarized us with the aircraft, its engines, equipment,
and armaments. They warned us that the red handles, knobs, and
levers were emergency control devices and we should better not touch
them. They informed us that the on-board documentation from which we
could familiarize ourselves with the aircraft was all present. They
conducted demonstration flights and then departed. It was left to us
quickly to master everything and commence combat operations with
this aircraft.
We found that all the
required descriptions, instructions, and schematics published by the
manufacturer were in the on-board documentation, but in the English
language, which we did not know. By all outward appearances, the
documentation was exceptional. It was printed on thick glossy paper
with colored schematics, sketches, drawings, and so on. The
instructions for maintenance of the aircraft were particularly
attractive. The text was accompanied by clear color cartoons, which
were understandable without knowledge of the English language, and
which instructively pointed out the consequences of mistakes and
negligence of the pilots in the air and of mechanics on the ground.
These visual aids, which often used humor as a tool, were always
helpful and certainly deserved duplication in our own renditions of
these instructions.
The caricatures were
amusing but we had to master the basics. This was a difficult
problem, the more so because the 125th BAP would arrive right behind
the 37th BAP. Considering all the obstacles, the following method
was chosen to master the aircraft. At our request, with the
assistance of General Repin, the chief engineer of the VVS KA [Red
Army Air Forces], a team of specialists of the New Equipment Bureau
(BNT) of the Central Aero-hydrodynamics Institute (TsAGI), along
with translators and engineers of the NII VVS KA who were
particularly interested in new equipment, arrived at the division.
Our maintenance personnel and mechanics from the repair base
disassembled one B-25C down to major sub-assemblies in a hangar to
permit familiarization with all systems and assemblies, and the best
approach to all aggregates and assemblies of construction. A time
schedule was developed jointly with the BNT team for the development
and compilation, over the course of a month, of all necessary
training materials—posters, system schematics, detailed sketches,
instructions for flight and maintenance personnel, and so on—in the
Russian language. In turn, the leadership of TsAGI and NII VVS
tasked their specialists who were participating in these efforts to
exploit everything that was new that could be of some interest for
our own [Soviet] design bureaus [3].
We, in turn, requested that they produce materials for our training
base.
In order to stimulate
the work of the TsAGI team in our interests [222d BAD], we
established the following understanding. If the TsAGI team adhered
closely to the agreed upon schedule for development and duplication
(in blueprints) of training devices, they would be fed in accordance
with the no. 5 (aviator’s) rations norm [4].
If they did not meet the schedule, they would all be fed in
accordance with the no. 2 rations norm. Viewed in hindsight, this
may seem an amusing and, perhaps, despotic method. But in wartime
conditions and our circumstances, associated with the time-sensitive
preparation of the regiments for combat employment, this was an
effective and necessary approach.
The problem of
training was resolved, but the no less important matter of providing
the regiments with the necessary ground support equipment remained.
They had to have lifting devices, trestles and stands, devices to
warm the engines, and so on. In addition, each aircraft had to be
reconfigured before it was turned over to the regiment. As a matter
of fact, in the USAAF a B-25 crew consisted of six men: two pilots,
navigator, bombardier, radio operator/gunner, and gunner. Our crew
consisted of five men, the functions of navigator and bombardier
being assigned to our navigator. The navigator’s working space with
his corresponding instrument panel was located in the compartment
behind the pilots’ seats. Therefore we transferred all the
navigator’s instruments to the nose compartment, where we also
mounted our own collimator sight NKPB-7.
The fuel cells were
not protected by fire-preventing neutral gases. We considered this
to be unacceptable and therefore, with the assistance of the design
bureau of NKAP (People’s Commissariat of Aviation Industry) Plant
No. 156, a system was rapidly developed to vent spent engine exhaust
gases into the fuel cells. At the same time we realized that
auxiliary fuel cells holding up to 220 gallons could be installed in
the aircraft under the wings and in the bomb bay.
Soviet aviation
production facilities had their own enormous production schedules
and difficulties. Therefore, in order to ensure that these
modifications to the aircraft were accomplished in a timely manner,
I personally appealed to the chief of the aviation department of the
Central Committee of the Communist Party (TsK VKP(b)), who at that
time was Major General of Aviation N. A. Shimanov. He listened very
attentively to our requests and literally in my presence passed down
by telephone his decisions regarding these issues. The design bureau
engineers and team of workers of a plant that had remained in Moscow
[5]
very quickly developed and produced everything that was required for
the reconfiguration of the aircraft. These same personnel, along
with workers of the Monino repair base and VVS maintenance personnel
carried out the reconfiguration of the regiments’ aircraft. The
order was also issued for the development and production of
auxiliary external (wing-mounted) and internal (bomb bay) fuel cells
with the exhaust-gas protection feature installed.
B-25D30, Alaska. Photo USAAF via Von
Hardesty.
Now a few words
regarding the characteristics of the B-25. This was a twin-engine,
by American standards medium bomber with tricycle landing gear. It
had a maximum take-off weight of 32—34,000 pounds (16 tons). Its
engines were Wright Cyclone R-2600-13/29 twin-row 18-cylinder
radials with a maximum rating of 1600 h.p. They burned only
100-octane fuel, which until 1944 was delivered by sea from the USA
in 5-gallon cans! Imagine what kind of difficulties were experienced
by our support personnel during the refueling of this aircraft from
cans, especially in winter conditions. This aircraft differed
markedly from Soviet-produced aircraft in the proliferation and
complexity of its electrical, radio, special equipment, and
armaments. It had a vast array of communications and
radio-navigational gear, electro-mechanical instruments, and
automatic devices. The remote-controlled guns and bomb-release
devices were totally electrically controlled. The aircraft was well
armed with paired heavy (12.7mm) machine guns in mounts (Bendix
Amplidyne turrets) that we encountered for the first time. They had
servo-electrical motors with synchronized meters and
electro-mechanical boosters. Among the radio and radio-navigational
devices, I should point out the SCR-274 transmitter-receiver,
SCR-269 Bendix radio compass, and Norden bombsight. The engines had
a system for reducing viscosity of the oil with gasoline [necessary
to simplify cold starts]. The nose gear had a shimmy damper and a
number of other innovations (for us).
Despite the number of
the B-25’s technical advances, the first incidences of freezing
temperatures showed that this airplane was not equipped for
utilization in Russian winter conditions. We experienced massive
numbers of failures of individual components of the aircraft:
electrical instruments, armaments, frozen and burst hydraulic brake
lines, the controls for raising and lowering the landing gear,
flaps, and bomb bay doors. Oil coolers cracked, engines misfired
because of spark plug failures, cracks appeared in the leads to the
plugs, and the carburetors failed.
We also had many
problems with the rubber fuel and oil cells, which were made from
several layers of rubber with varying physical characteristics. The
manufacturer had calculated that if a projectile or shell fragment
penetrated a fuel cell, the middle layer of raw rubber would swell
upon contact with the gasoline or oil and seal up the hole. However,
with the onset of sharply falling temperature of the surrounding
air, which happened frequently in our part of the world, the inner
layer of the fuel and oil cells began to crack, and under the
influence of the gasoline (and oil) the rubber in the middle layer
“gave way”. Pieces of dissolved (jelly-like) raw rubber found their
way into the fuel (oil) cell and, more importantly, plugged the
holes in fuel and oil lines and the fuel filters. The replacement of
these fuel cells was quite complicated, time-consuming, and
backbreaking work, particularly when there were no exchange cells,
and if the work had to be accomplished in cold temperatures or when
snow was falling. Because of the technical characteristics of these
“Americans”, in the winter our maintenance personnel as a rule
experienced frozen and wind-burned faces and swollen and cracked
hands and fingers. The distinctive Russian savvy, resourcefulness,
initiative, and great industriousness and forbearance of our
engineering and maintenance personnel came to the rescue.
Despite all the
difficulties and the shortages of adequate quantities of ground
support equipment for the aircraft, the order to send the regiment
off to combat duty with these new aircraft was carried out on time.
The first to execute their combat missions were the crews of the
37th BAP, followed 2—3 weeks later by the remaining regiments. The
entire division was flying combat sorties and at the same time
intensively continued to upgrade their technical service of the
aircraft. The air and ground crews polished their skills in flying
the aircraft and working on it at any time of the day or night and
during poor weather conditions. It should be stated that this
improvement continued until the end of the war, due not only to
better mastery of and employment of the aircraft in combat but also
to the receipt of new and more modern versions of the aircraft:
B-25C, B-25D, B-25J, and B-25G. We also continued to receive combat
aircrew replacements.
Before the end of
1944, our corps [6]
practically had a monopoly on the demand for B-25s, and therefore we
were keenly aware of the tempo of their delivery via lend-lease.
Spare parts, aggregates, hoses, tires, engines, and other materiel
were delivered to us in quite limited quantities in 1942—43. New
difficulties were added to those already listed. These included the
premature failure in winter of the outer casings of the tires and
disk brakes [7],
the constant demand for auxiliary fuel cells, and local manufacture
or supply of specific engine parts, specialized ground support
equipment, spark plugs, and plug wires.
Guided by support of
the Central Committee in the form of General Shimanov, and
commensurate directorate of the VVS KA, we appealed directly to the
management of NKAP plants. Despite their exceptional war production
obligations, these manufacturing enterprises responded rapidly to
our requests. Representatives from the serial design bureaus came to
us and we showed them examples of what we needed. When we did not
have examples, we drew up sketches of what was required. In short
order we established and qualified the technical requirements for
the manufacture of all these items. After an agreed upon time,
followed by inspection of the developmental examples, we began to
take delivery of fuel cells, rubber tires, cranes, and a series of
spare parts for engines and aircraft. It must be said that our
improvised production fully justified itself and when mounted on the
aircraft these parts were more reliable than the American components
they replaced. It must also be noted that technical agreements
signed by us as users and the representatives of the production
facilities, by which serial production of all these items was
realized, were executed without unnecessary ratification “at the
top”, as was required before the war.
In the same vein,
later we learned that bureaucracy was also not in vogue in the USA.
From documents that came with the aircraft we learned that the
wartime commander in chief of the USAAF, General Hap Arnold, issued
an order that empowered a certain Major Brown, I repeat—major
(apparently a lead engineer), to make decisions regarding the B-25
and to pass them down in the form of requirements to the
manufacturer—North American, which was a lead supplier (general
contractor). This major also issued instructions to military units
who were using the aircraft. We considered this procedure to be
fully justified.
As we gained
experience in the combat employment of the B-25 aircraft, we
discovered specific deficiencies in the design and construction of
several of its components. Our own engineers and mechanics came up
with corrective suggestions. We discussed these among ourselves and
periodically sent them off to the chief of the import commission of
the VVS KA, General Levendovich. And wouldn’t you know, two or three
months later we would receive B-25 aircraft in which our complaints
and recommendations, as a rule, were addressed. This responsiveness
of the manufacturer is explained by the energetic actions of the
corresponding representatives of the Soviet Union in the USA and the
significant authority given to the above-mentioned Major Brown. This
system that functioned without official stamps and countless
authorizing signatures also proved itself regarding foreign orders.
The war could not wait for rank bureaucracy.
Our RGK (reserve of
the supreme high command) division conducted intensive combat work
with all three regiments day and night, primarily supporting Western
Front [8].
Unexpectedly, at the end of 1942 they assigned us to the 1st Bomber
Corps of the VVS, which at that time was commanded by Major General
of Aviation V. A. Sudets [9].
His deputy for IAS (aviation engineering service) was Engineer
Lieutenant Colonel A. P. Shepelev. Working conditions for the
division were not improved by this change, the more so because some
of the documents for the “top” we now were required to sign at the
corps level. And we frequently were summoned to corps headquarters
to give reports on how we were working.
The corps
specialists, naturally, were not familiar in depth with our foreign
equipment. The 1st BAK did not have its own technical repair units
and they were unable to provide us with technical advice or
assistance at the required level to repair our aviation equipment.
Taking into consideration the capabilities of the corps chief
engineer, and in the interests of the required rapid response, as
before we turned to the services of the VVS KA, to industry, and
when special problems arose, also to the Central Committee and
Comrade Shimanov. Strange as it may seem, these circumstances became
more frequent with our transfer to the 1st BAK. If the delivery of
new B-25 aircraft from the USA was more or less normal, then the
situation in spare parts, engines, aggregates, and equipment grew
steadily worse. The Americans had put us on short rations; “choke
points” were experienced for the first time because of a number of
our “transgressions” in the employment of as yet insufficiently
mastered equipment.
B-25D30, Alaska. Photo USAAF via Von
Hardesty.
Now a few words
regarding the ferrying of the B-25 from the USA. Early in the war,
about to the end of 1942, B-25 aircraft were flown by American crews
from the USA via the southern route across northern Africa, Syria,
and Iran to an airfield at the port city of Basra, where they were
received and ferried to our division [10].
But this route was long and its traverse of a number of other
countries was in itself a cause of difficulty and delay. In response
to requests by our representatives in the USA, the ferry route was
shifted to the north. The Americans flew the aircraft to an airfield
at Fairbanks, Alaska. Here, under the leadership of Hero of the
Soviet Union I. P. Mazuruk, was based a group of Soviet ferry pilots
[11].
These pilots flew the B-25s onward to the Krasnoyarsk airfield. Our
division pilots received the aircraft at Krasnoyarsk and flew them
to our division base. The multiple-stage northern route made great
demands on Soviet maintenance personnel, especially in the winter,
regarding receipt and inspection of the aircraft and all of its
on-board equipment, instruments, emergency supplies, and so on.
There were some instances when a portion of the emergency equipment
(rubber rafts, rifles, down-filled sleeping bags, rations, and so
on) was missing [12],
and engineering-technical personnel of the division had to scurry
about and locate them.
From all of this it
is obvious that the serviceability of the aircraft pool and the
combat readiness of the division’s units were entrusted to us,
beginning with the ferrying itself and ending with the repair of the
aircraft from combat damage in conditions of persistent shortages of
parts and particularly of engines. At the same time, the command
element of 1st BAK, aware of the division’s high level of combat
readiness, employed it intensively. The division commander
systematically assigned missions not only for bombing enemy strong
points and airfields but also to “work over” the forward edge of the
front line, and in daylight, no less. Because it was not a dive
bomber, the B-25 was somewhat lethargic at low altitudes and the
regiment began to experience significant losses, which were not
being replaced by new aircraft. In a short time the number of combat
ready aircraft available fell sharply.
We were faced with a
difficult problem. Either we would soon become “horseless” and after
such gigantic effort to master this foreign equipment they would
send us to the rear for reconstitution on other airplanes [13],
or we had to find another method of employment. Division commander
Titov called together the division’s command personnel to discuss
this problem. By this time, during the ferrying of the aircraft on
the long sections of the route, using American flight computers we
had begun to figure out the most efficient flight regimes for flight
range and duration [14].
Analyzing these ferry flights, we came to the conclusion that if we
mounted auxiliary fuel cells in the B-25, it could and should be
employed as a long-range bomber. From this we decided that our real
role was in long-range aviation (ADD). Our opinion was backed up by
the experience of the combat work of ADD units that flew the Il-4 [15],
which were based along side us at Monino airfield. All the time we
had been looking at their flights and comparing them with our own.
Considering and analyzing all of this information, the commanders’
conference made the following decision: without advertising or
reporting it to the staff of 1st BAK, conduct an experimental flight
into the rear of the country to a specific range in a combat
profile, with a bomb drop at the turnaround point of the route.
Division commander F. V. Titov took upon himself the responsibility
to clear the flight with PVO strany [national air defense] and we,
the headquarters specialists of engineering, navigation, and flight
services, took care of preparing the crew and aircraft for this
experiment.
A flight route was
selected to the target some 1500 kilometers distant with a bomb load
of 2000 kilograms. The aircraft was outfitted with a locally
produced 220-gallon fuel cell in the bomb bay. This “covert” flight
was flown at an altitude of from 3000 to 4000 meters with an average
cruise speed of 300—330 km/hr to the bombing range. The results of
this experiment confirmed our calculations. Yes, the aircraft by its
equipping and configuration was fully capable of employment,
particularly at night, as an effective long-range bomber. The
results of the flight were written up in a summary that presented
the basic parameters of the aircraft and its characteristics and
showed all the calculations and data that were collected during the
test flight. Colonel Titov, based on our suggestions, made a wise
decision: that I, as his deputy, would go to the ADD headquarters
and attempt “to make the case”. It was obvious that the division
commander himself did not have the right to do this without
permission of the corps commander. And we knew that General Sudets
would never give this permission.
Executing this mission, I arrived at the office of the chief
engineer of ADD, Lieutenant General of Engineering-Technical
Services I. V. Markov, and reported that my visit was unofficial and
I was asked to deliver a report about our long-range flight. We
believed that having done so would further enable us to suggest
ourselves, the 222d BAD, as a candidate for assignment to ADD.
I.V.Markov smiled
understandingly, and said that the essence, and not the
appropriateness, of our actions was paramount. “Give us your summary
report, we already also know something about your division.” He
studied the report closely and asked several questions regarding the
qualitative and quantitative indicators of the division. He
suggested that we leave the material with him for the commander in
chief of ADD, General A. E. Golovanov. Several days later the
commander, division navigator, and senior engineer were invited to
General Golovanov’s office, where we reported in detail about the
basis of the data, how we obtained it, and what remained
unobtainable. After this we received an instruction from the GKO
(State Defense Committee) that literally said, “222d BAD (division
commander Titov, V. F.) is transferred to the forces of Long-Range
Aviation”. The entire personnel component of the regiments and
division command element received this pronouncement with great
satisfaction. Thus, having spent less than three months assigned to
the 1st BAK, as of 29 September 1942 we became the 222d BAD of ADD.
Materials preserved
and made available for publication in Mir Aviatsii by E. E. Kulman
[1]
These events occurred in the summer of 1942 [editor’s note]. 101
B-25s were delivered to the USSR through the Persian corridor in
1942 and 23 in 1943. [JG]
[2]
222d Bomber Aviation Division (BAD) [editor’s note].
[3]
It is clear from this and other similar accounts that Soviet
designers and engineers studied every piece of military and
non-military equipment they received through lend-lease as part of a
rational and purposeful technical intelligence collection operation.
[JG]
[4]
In the wartime Soviet Union, every category of person was assigned
to a rations caloric norm, with front-line military personnel being
at the top of this food chain and nonworking civilians at the
bottom. Clearly, aviators enjoyed a ration norm of much higher
caloric content than the workers from the TsAGI. [JG]
[5] A
large number of aircraft production facilities located in the
western portion of the Soviet Union had been evacuated to Soviet
territory east of the Ural Mountains during the first year of the
war. [JG]
[6]
4th Guards Gomel Air Corps, created on the basis of 4th Guards
Long-Range Air Division [editor’s note].
[7]
The pilots used the hydraulic brakes on the Mitchell just like the
pneumatic brakes on their Soviet aircraft. This resulted in rapid
failure of the friction linings of the pads [editor’s note].
[8]
37th, 16th, and 125th BAPs [editor’s note].
[9]
V.A.Sudets (b. 1904) joined the Soviet Army in 1925 and completed
pilot training in 1929. He served as an advisor and flight
instructor in Mongolia during the mid-1930s and fought in the
Soviet—Finnish War of 1939—40. From August 1941 he commanded the air
forces of the 51st Army, then of the Volga Military District, and
1st Bomber Aviation Corps. From March 1943 until the end of the war
he was commander of 17th Air Army. He received the award Hero of the
Soviet Union in April 1945. After the war Colonel General Sudets was
chief of staff and deputy commander in chief of the Soviet Air
Force. He was promoted to Marshal of Aviation in 1955 and served as
commander of PVO Strany [national air defense] forces from 1962—66.
In 1966 he joined the group of general inspectors of the Ministry of
Defense of the USSR. Marshal Sudets died in 6 May 1981 in Moscow.
[Geroi Sovetskogo Soiuza, Moscow: Voyenizdat, 1988, II:538—9. JG]
[10]
For additional reading on the subject of delivery of lend-lease
aircraft through the Persian Corridor, go to T. H. Vail Motter, The
Persian Corridor and Aid to Russia, chapter VII (Washington:
Government Printing Office, 1952). According to this chapter, the
first B-25s arrived at Basra on 12 March 1942. This volume is one of
the Army “Green-book” series, the official history of the US Army’s
participation in World War II. [JG]
[11]
Mazuruk (b. 1906) was a civilian pilot from 1930—38, who received
the HSU award for landing the first Soviet scientific expedition at
the North Pole in 1937. He flew as a military pilot in the
Soviet—Finnish War of 1939—40, and was commander of a Northern Fleet
naval air force unit until 1943. He was then assigned as a division
commander to the position of chief of the Alaska—Krasnoyarsk (ALSIB)
ferry route. He retired at the rank of major general in 1953, but
continued to fly arctic scientific missions. In 1956 he commanded a
detachment in the first Soviet naval expedition to the Antarctic.
[Geroi Sovetskogo Soiuza, Moscow: Voyenizdat, 1988, II:11—12. JG]
[12]
The author, having flown on one of the B-25s from the USA, had a
conversation with Mazuruk “at a heated level”, after which these
disappearances ceased to occur [editor’s note].
[13]
It was common practice in the Soviet Air Force to employ an air
regiment until its combat strength in aircraft and crews was almost
gone, then send it to a rear-area reserve base where the regiment
was replenished in both crews and aircraft. In many cases this
opportunity would also be used to transition the unit to a new type
of aircraft. [JG]
[14]
This was a slide-rule-type device common to all USAAF aircraft,
known as a “computer, air navigation, dead-reckoning. [JG]
[15]
The Il-4, also known as the DB-3F, was a twin-engine bomber with a
payload of approximately 5,500 pounds, ceiling of 31,800 feet,
cruise speed of 200 knots, and range of 2,400 miles. It had a crew
of 3. [JG]
