WORLD WAR II, MY PART:
During the course of writing my Nomad News series, I have mentioned some events or experiences. I thought I should be more explicit and a good place to start might be here in Crossville. Several years ago I was asked to speak to a group of 8th Grade students. I was warned that one of them would ask me if I ever killed anyone. I tried to explain that war was not a noble event and, unfortunately, a lot of people were killed; that out of about 16 million troops in uniform, only a small part were actually engaged in face to face battle. The rest were support troops in various ways. In my job as a photo interpreter, I selected targets and then ordered bomber or fighter squadrons to follow through. I guess that makes me an accomplice of sorts, unfortunately.
In addition to saving England and freeing the rest of the Western European continent, I always believed we freed the German people from under the hobnail boots of a ruthless dictator, too. I have no idea how many Germans would agree. In 1945, probably not very many. However, I have an intelligence bulletin on the interrogation of a 26-year old woman named Hilda Martin wherein she stated the German people would never surrender. They would fight from the hills and forests, they would sabotage, and so on. She was portrayed as being of average intelligence and representing the view of the general population. This did not materialize to a great extent according to all the intelligence I saw during that period.
Off and on, I have mentioned events or happenings during the war, so I thought I might put in print what I did ..I had ten prewar buddies that served in the military. In the Army, Marine Corps, Navy Air Corps, Merchant Marine, and I have no idea just what any of them did and they had no idea about me. We just rejoined and continued where we left off in 1941. We just never talked about it. It was something we had to do. We did it. And, fortunately, we all returned home.
For the first three years I was Headquarters Staff Sergeant in the 103rd Observation Squadron, Pennsylvania Air National Guard which had been nationalized. Year one, mostly training. Years two and three, anti-submarine patrol off the East coast. Years four and five,overseas as Photo Interpreter with the 33rd Photo Reconnaissance Squadron. The times are roughly.
Members of the Photo Intelligence Section played a major role in both the preparation for the invasion of the continent and continuing throughout the entire Western European campaign. Photo Reconnaissance had been proven to be indispensable in the planning of military strategy and seeking out the enemy's secrets since the days of the hand-held cameras but it had taken new meaning with the advent of World War II. Fast-flying aircraft, new automatic cameras and modern laboratory equipment, made it possible to turn out as many as 20,000 prints a day. In 1938, German General von Fitsch said: "The country with the best photo reconnaissance will win the next war." And, we had the best.
I has the ranking NCO in Photo Intelligence and responsible for overseeing the flow and interpretation of the prints as soon as we received them from the Lab. We had the operation so well organized that Camera Repair could remove the cameras from the returning aircraft, rush them to the Lab, and have prints under interpretation in less than an hour. We performed First Phase interpretation; looking for locomotives under steam, troop movements, changes in airfield activity and other targets of opportunity. These targets were relayed to the proper units for actions. As other areas of interpretation were completed and plotted, the information was rushed to Group Headquarters where detailed interpretation was done and the intelligence then relayed to the ground forces in the matter of a couple of hours.
At various times we were attached to the First Army and the Third Army. We landed on Omaha Beach as soon as the ground forces broke through at St. Lo and the Army Engineers could get in and prepare a temporary landing strip of interlocking steel plates.
This attests to the importance the military placed on photo intelligence. As the ground forces advanced, we advanced not far behind.
Now comes the part I have difficulty with. In a brown envelope in the bottom drawer of a file cabinet where I store my WW2 data, are the medals and awards I received. I do not display them because they are not what we fought for. I display the ribbons only on my VFW cover (cap). Because they are part of the story, I am going to enter them here: Presidential Unit Citation, Belgium Fourragere, American Defense Service Medal, American Campaign Medal, Good Conduct Medal, World War II Victory Medal, European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign with Silver Star and Bronze Star for the following campaigns: Air Offense Europe, Ardennes, Central Europe, Normandy, Northern France, Rhineland
The medals belong to my comrades who never returned.
As far as the Cumberland County Veterans Service officer can ascertain, as of this date, I am the oldest of 142 World War II veterans in the county. (Copyright 2014 - Andrew M. Dolan)
Thursday, July 10, 2014
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