India-Burma Theater Roundup
Vol. III   No. 24.                                             Reg. No. L5015
 Delhi,  Thursday                                        February  22,  1945.
S/Sgt. Theodore J. Tomski, crew chief of the C-46, record-breaking Curtis Commando, tries to explain how the airplane functions to two six-year-old British youngsters, David McCrea and Chester Morris, who visited the 1333rd Base Unit to see the airplane at close range. The plane flew over their homes 844 times, having made 422 round-trips over the Hump.

BRITISH  KIDS  PAY  VISIT
TO  FAMILIAR  AIRPLANE

    1333D BU, ASSAM - C-46 Curtiss Commando No. 603 flew over the homes of Masters Chester Morris and David McCrea, two British children who live near here, 844 times before they were invited to the Base to see it at close range.
  No. 603 made 422 round trips across The Hump in less than a year's time, establishing an all-time record of trips across The Hump. The crew chief, S/Sgt. Theodore J. Tomski, of Blossburg, Pa., met the children when they were brought on the Base by an officer who had become acquainted with their parents.
  The children had never seen an airplane on the ground. They asked numerous questions, and Chester summed it all up with "The airplane is quite a remarkable invention."
  The C-46, named Censored, is now off to the glue factory getting a complete overhaul.


‘ROUNDUP’ PASSES OUT USA GUIDE

    The Roundup, dipping into the pool of the future with the realization that personnel now overseas some day will be forced to accept an assignment in Uncle Sugar Able, is printing this short, practical guide to that country.
  The United States is composed of land which is bisected in the center by the Mississippi River. Everything east of the river is known as New York and everything west is known as Texas. There are a few other States, but their status in the union is not exactly known.

SOFT BEDS COMMON
  When you get to Shangri-La, do not be inveigled into sleeping in one of the big, soft matressed beds that are so common. Many cases of curvature of the spine have resulted from this practice. In order to get a good night's sleep, carry a blanket and sleep on the floor.
  When taking a shower, care must be taken, as hot water is fairly common, and cases of G.I.'s being scalded are a common report.
  Food is generally plentiful but in some localities powdered eggs are almost impossible to obtain. You probably will be forced to eat the shell-covered kind on most occasions. Remember, do not eat the shells, simply crack the egg and toss away the outer covering.

DEHYDRATION SCARCE
  Dehydrated vegetables also are scarce - being almost extinct in the U.S.A. Stores have on display potatoes, carrots, spinach, and turnips in their raw and natural state. You will notice pieces of soil still clinging to these items. Wash before eating.
  In many restaurants you will see an item called steak on the menu. It tastes pretty good when you get used to it. Of course it doesn't compare with our very own spam and corned willy.
  Water comes out of faucets unchlorinated. It is wise to carry a small packet of chlorine with you. We advise your very own private lister bag.

SPOILED STUFF
  You will have to be very cautious when ordering drinks in bars and saloons. Bartenders will try to sell old, aged stocks of Scotch and Bourbon. Don't be taken in by such practices. Some whiskey is 20 to 30 years old and obviously spoiled.
  The country is occupied by Republicans, Democrats and a few other off breeds; but the Democrats have been running it for quite some time.
  Watch yourself when you get back, especially if you are in Brooklyn or Texas, and you will probably be able to get along, and possibly make a few friends among the native population.


STRIPES PIN ON STARS
Judge Advocate General Clarence C. Fenn has his brigadier general stars pinned on by T/Sgt. John Derr, Roundup staff, and M/Sgt. John Delene, who is chief clerk in the JAG. Derr saw the news flash from Washington confirming Fenn's promotion.  he took it in to let the new general know.  As well-wishers crowded around Fenn from other offices, Fenn said he wished to have his stars pinned on by enlisted men.  So while the brass stood back the sergeants did the honors.  Derr is at left and Delene at right.

UP FOUR I-B COLONELS
TO BRIGADIER RANK

 Roundup Staff Article
  Four India-Burma colonels were raised to the rank of brigadier generals this week following Senate confirmation of their nomination by President Roosevelt.
  The new one-star generals are Clarence C. Fenn, of Antigo, Wis., Judge Advocate General; Gene Hall of New York City, SOS Chief of Staff; Frank D. Hackett, of Brainard, Minn., Bengal Air Depot Commander, and Edward C. Rose of Greenfield, Mass. and Trenton, N.J., commanding Transportation Service, SOS.
  The India-Burma nominations were included in a list of 78 names that had been sent to the Senate for confirmation. Upper House action was postponed for a week due to opposition to promotion of Col. Elliott Roosevelt, son of the President, who was under fire due to his dog, Blaze, having received priority over three servicemen, one of them being T/Sgt. Dave Aks of this Theater.

ACTION POSTPONED
  Action on the brigadier list was postponed a week. When all of the list, including Elliott, was approved, a flow of Senate oratory engulfed the choice of FDR's son.
  Sen. Harlan J. Bushfield (R.-S.D.) said he voiced the silent protest of 9,600 colonels who could not be promoted and said they felt keenly about "advancement of youngsters" who were wholly amateurs at the military game. Bushfield centered his attack on the 34-year-old Elliott, who has risen from captain to brigadier since the start of the war, around the Blaze incident. Democrats defended Elliott's record, saying the recommendation had come from the War Department, not from the White House.

DEBATE CLOSED
  The debate closed after Bushfield said he didn't place much credence in the statement of Col. Ray W. Ireland of ATC that he had issued Blaze an "A" priority on his own initiative. When Bushfield again asked why 9,600 other colonels were not being considered for promotion, Sen. Clyde M. Reed (R.-Kan.) suggested, "They're not all sons of the President."
  Brig. Gen. Fenn came to this Theater in March, 1942. He took over the job of Judge Advocate General as a member of Gen. Joseph W. Stilwell's original staff.
  Fenn arranged for the U.S. to maintain jurisdiction over its own personnel in India and China. Fenn conferred with British, Indian and Chinese officials to bring this decision about. In Fenn's first days here he did not have a single assistant. Today the India-Burma Theater alone has eight general courts-martial jurisdictions and officers and men reaching from Ceylon to the Chinese border in Burma. Fenn's office also handles claims and civil affairs.

ENTERED ARMY 1917
  Fenn received degrees from Georgetown and Wisconsin Universities. Entering the Army in 1917, he served during World War I and was overseas in France. He has served in Hawaii and the Philippines.
  Brig. Gen. Hall entered the Army in March, 1942, as a major in the Corps of Engineers. he was an engineer in civilian life in the firm of Parsons, Brinckerhoff, Hogan and MacDonald of Maiden Lane in New York City. He arrived in this Theater Dec. 12, 1943.
  Brig. Gen. Rose was formerly vice-president of the Public Service Co. of New Jersey. Before becoming Transportation Officer, he was liaison officer to the British Military and Civilian authorities in Assam. He received the

STRICTLY G.I.              By Ehret
Legion of Merit for his work with this group.
  Brig. Gen. Hackett has been commanding officer of the Bengal Air Depot since Dec., 1943. He entered the Army in 1917. Hackett was the first man to make a solo flight over the Sierra Nevada Mountains and now holds the ratings of both Command Pilot and Combat Observer. He was instrumental in building the air base at Kirtland Field, N.M.



British Enlarge Singu Breach
 Roundup Staff Article

  British 14th Army troops have enlarged their captured bridgehead of Singu over the Irrawaddy in the face of stern opposition this week. Singu, on the east bank of the Irrawaddy, is 44 air miles from Mandalay.
  To the southwest other British elements had a fierce seven-hour battle but finally captured Sulegon in the peninsula formed in the confluence of the Chindwin and Irrawaddy Rivers.
  The town of Seikpuy has also fallen to British elements. The seizure of this town, 115 miles to the northwest, threatens to out-flank Mandalay.
  Along the Arakan coats troops of the 25th Indian Division made another landing, this time at Ru-Ywa, about 69 miles southeast of Akyab. There was no opposition. This was the fifth amphibious landing along the coast by the 15th Indian Corps in 44 days.
  West African troops and part of the 15th Indian Corps have run into stiffened enemy opposition in the Arakan Valley, where they have been trying to expand their Kangaw bridgehead.



NO STATESIDE CIG RELIEF EXPECTED

    NEW YORK - (ANS) - The Big City went all out this week to relieve the acute cigarette shortage plaguing the nation, but the situation still looked as dark as a Burmese jungle in August, with indications pointing to continued troubles on the civilian front.
  Service personnel still are as well supplied as ever.
  This week the OPA announced after an informal pow-wow with jobbers and wholesalers that starting within a few days store would put cigarettes - if any - in full view on the counters, not under. This put a damper on the new brand dubbed "stoopies" by the wiseacres. Clerks have been slipping favored customers "stoopies" from under the counter when the uninformed weren't looking.
  That doesn't mean everybody is going to get smokes, however. Daniel P. Wooley, Regional Administrator for the OPA here, said that only 60 to 70 percent of the 1943 cigarette consumption would be available this year.
  Unperturbed by the shortage, 12 hitch-hiking soldiers in Portland, Ore., found a new way to get rides. They take Portland or Seattle signs off highway posts and hold them out with the bait dangling. The bait, of course, is every guy's favorite brand.
  In Washington, the Federal Trade Commission investigating the shortage at the instigation of Congress

WE GUARANTEE THEY ARE NOT TWINS
Sgt. Henry Palejczyk, Base Engineers' electrician at the 1333rd Base Unit, points to his double.  They are both Sgt. Henry Palejczyk.  His hobby is trick photography.  Not only did he pose twice in the same picture but he also snapped and developed it and printed his own negative in his homemade basha workshop.  Ah, that Palejczyk ingenuity.
gave another answer for the shortage. Too much prosperity with more people with money who never indulged having taken up the habit has cut out the supply of the regular smokes.
  An incident in Buffalo, N.Y., spot-lights the shortage and throws a new aspect on the picture. Thomas Farrell, 56, who gave up drinking five years ago but just couldn't stop smoking, had a ready explanation this week when arraigned on a drunkenness charge. "You see, Judge," he said, "you want a cigarette. You go into a tavern. Whether you're on the wagon or not, you've got to buy a couple of drinks before even approaching the bartender on the subject of buying smokes."
  Farrell said he lost track of the number of tap rooms he visited in an attempt to buy cigarettes and conceded he may have had too many drinks.
  Sentence was suspended.



WEART DEPUTY CG
OF CHINA THEATER


  CHUNGKING - Brig. Gen. Douglas L. Weart has replaced Maj. Gen. Gilbert Cheves as Deputy Commander of the United States Forces in the China Theater, it was announced this week.
  Weart will also be commanding general of Rear Echelon troops, Cheves remains as commanding general of SOS in the China Theater.
YANK PRISONERS IN MANCHUKUO

  WASHINGTON - (ANS) - The Japanese shifted 177 American war prisoners, including Lt. Gen. Jonathan M. Wainwright, from prison camps on Formosa to Mukden in Manchukuo last November, the War Department disclosed this week.
  The group included 17 other generals, 119 colonels, six Navy captains and 34 enlisted men.



‘JUNKMEN’ GET BRONZE STARS

    HQ., 10TH AIR FORCE, BURMA - "The Burma Junkmen" collect salvage and instruments from 10th Air Force planes downed in the jungles of Burma.
  In the words of Capt. Gari King, CO of liaison squadrons, "The salvage sorties they make into the jungles are practically our main source of supply for instrument and replacement parts."
  The leading spirits of the Burma Junkmen are M/Sgt. Roy F. Kappel of Wakefield, Kan., and First Sgt. James O. Roberts of Cement, Okla. They were recently awarded Bronze Stars for their work.
  Kappel's toughest mission was one by which he had to travel by leaky boat to a sand bar in the middle of a river deep in the jungle. He was accompanied on this trip by Sgt. Kenneth Harner and Sgt. Edmund G. Omdoil. The trio were on the sand bar for six days and finally had to be evacuated by a liaison plane.


First member of the Mars Task Force to set foot on the Burma Road was Lt. Alfred T. Martin of Salem, Va., who received a field commission after leading a patrol which placed demolition charges of TNT and mortar shells in the middle of a Jap-held supply artery to blow a crater in the famous highway. A veteran jungle fighter, Martin has been in the Army five years and was a tech sergeant during the previous Burma campaign.

  By SGT. ALAN KAYES     Roundup Field Correspondent

    HQ., MARS TASK FORCE - February 2 was one of the big days in the attempt of the Mars Task Force to cut the Burma Road as they drove towards Lashio.
  On that day, Lt. Col. George T. Laughlin of the 124th Infantry and Lt. Col. Loren D. Pegg of New York went along as observers with three platoons. At the jump-off the platoon leader and platoon sergeant were wounded. Laughlin and Pegg jumped into the breach. Laughlin taking over two squads, Pegg the third, designating themselves as sergeant and corporal respectively. They advanced with the platoon to its objective.
  Sgt. Clyde M. Stockton of San Antonio, Tex., started up the hill in the same engagement carrying an M-1, a grease gun (the new all-metal .45 caliber submachine gun) and a pistol.
  As this walking arsenal advanced up the hill his platoon leader's M-1 gave out. Stockton swapped the M-1 for the one he carried, and proceeded up the hill, firing as he went. Pvt. John Valdez, of Houston, yelled that his M-1 had jammed, so Stockton swapped rifles with him and continued firing his grease gun. When he ran out of ammo, Stockton ran to a wounded man, picked up a carbine, jammed it into a pillbox, and fired until the magazine was empty. He ran back for rifle grenades, dropped by one of his own men, borrowed another M-1 that was working, picked up a musette bag of carbine ammo from still another wounded man, and went on leading his squad, ending up on top of the hill with all his guns and part of his carbine ammo left.
  "I didn't see any reason for throwing an M-1 away - I knew the fight would be over and I could repair it," he explained afterwards.

REAL TEXAN
  Another Texas sergeant from Houston, whose mother is a staff sergeant in the WAC, went into action carrying a Lone Star State flag tied to his rifle, which he intended to plant on the hilltop. He started up the hill as a mortar observer, but when the telephone wire ran out he went on as a rifleman. He grenaded two pillboxes, joined Stockton in a melee in front of a nest of pillboxes, and caught shrapnel in the leg when a Jap returned an American grenade which burst in front of him.
  He killed the Jap with his rifle as he fell to the ground, and then was carried down the hill to an aid station. Twice he sneaked out of the aid station and started up the hill with the flag in his hand, and each time the aidmen caught him and dragged him back. They took him to a portable surgical hospital where they kept him overnight, but released him the next morning and back he went with the flag.
  But he didn't plant it on the hilltop. His CO finally prevailed upon him to plant it some place else, explaining, "It's too large a flag and too bare a hill, and besides, the Yankees in this outfit who fought just as hard as you Texans did, won't like it."

YANKEES THERE TOO
  And there were Yankees fighting in the outfit side by side with their battle-happy Texas buddies. A bazooka gunner, from Cincinnati, threw away his bazooka when it failed to work, picked up an M-1 and a handful of grenades and went into the attack with the rest of his troop. When they reached their objective he became an aidman and litter-bearer, and although untrained in first aid, did what the medics called an amazing job. He was killed by a Jap sniper as he helped evacuate a patient down the hill to the squadron aid station.
  Pfc. Albert Z. Sutton, of Chicago, a mild-mannered troop clerk who was a writer in civilian life, asked for line duty to be near a buddy. When another friend was shot down right before his eyes, Sutton went berserk. He grabbed a grease gun and went from pillbox to pillbox, blasting Japs. He ignored a Jap Namboo machine gun which was firing at him at point blank range, killed the gunner, and accounted for four more Japs. He arrived at the objective unscathed, but pale and shaken by the experience.
JAP PLUNDER
Cpl. Albert Silva of San Antonio, Tex. (right), and Pvt. Edward R. Purdin of Greenfield, O., examine a captured Jap light machine gun. The Namboo was taken from a Jap who tried to charge the heavy machine gun position held by the two G.I.'s on a hill.


KNOCK ON HEAD
  Sgt. Kim Hill of Champaign, Ill., a former U of Illinois student, was fired on by a Namboo, jumped into a foxhole he had just grenaded and landed on a live Jap. Hill couldn't reached his own bayonet, so he grabbed the Jap's sword with his right hand and wrestled with him for possession. The Jap, armed with a percussion type grenade, pounded it on Hill's forehead to set it off and kill them both. Hill clawed it from the Nip's hand, tossed it away as it exploded, then stabbed the Jap in the throat with his own sword.
  Lt. Leo C. Tynan, Jr., of San Antonio, went along with the troop of Lt. Jack Knight of Mineral Wells, Tex., as a field artillery observer. He had specifically requested the assignment. As they went up the hill together, with Knight blasting pillboxes and shouting encouragement to his men, a Jap tried to bayonet the troop leader but Tynan killed the Nip.
  Later Tynan reorganized the platoon, re-establishing communications, then led them on in the attack on a new objective under heavy artillery fire.

OFFICERS PRAISED
  One enlisted man, as he came off the trail leading from the perimeter, remarked, "Our officers have done some of the god-damnedest fighting I've ever heard of in my life."
  He had just seen Capt. William Wood, another Texan, and leader of a combat column, pick up a 30 caliber machine gun which had lost its mount as a result of a direct hit. He picked up the machine gun and led his troops up the hill, firing at pillboxes from the hip, sometimes bracing the gun in the crotch of a tree. He finally ran out of ammo. Reorganizing his units, he found that his artillery observer had been killed, so Wood contacted Mars artillery on his own radio, using cavalry talk, and directed fire on Jap positions by compass, gun direction, shell strikes and any other means that came to mind. So successful was Woods in his sensings that artillery used his directions as a concentration number and knocked out Jap positions completely.

SIDE BY SIDE
  There were other officers who fought with distinction side by side with their men. A lieutenant from Minneapolis, twice wounded veteran of the Myitkyina campaign, and wearer of the Silver Star, had killed his first Jap in the new campaign on January 19th, when he led his troops to an objective in a dusk attack. He volunteered for a combat patrol mission on February 4th, and the 29-year-old lieutenant was the first to go down under Jap sniper fire.
  Maj. George B. Jordon, of Douglas, Ariz., led his troops forward into high ground near Kawngsong, after Mars artillery laid down an intensive barrage. His group was the "Blue Chips" column - each man distinguished by the blue poker chip worn on a string around the neck. Jordon and his men gained their objective in the bitter fighting in this area, in time to hear Lt. Col. Caifson Johnson, former professional wrestler of Minneapolis, radio to Maj. John Lattin, another column commander: "Come on up, John, I have a new home for you." Johnson had moved his men across the floor of the Hosi Valley at dawn, and then up a 2,000-foot mountain to reach Loi Kang.
  Heroism wasn't confined to men in the line. A Brooklyn G.I. had tried his best to lead a mule, but just couldn't handle the animal. He pleaded to stay with the outfit, so they made him an aidman. He gave his life on Feb. 2, when he crawled out beyond the perimeter to rescue an enlisted man wounded and pinned down by fire.

LOSES HAND
  At Tonkwa, a staff sergeant picked up a grenade tossed at him and tried to throw it back but it exploded and tore away his hand. He didn't want sympathy. "Hell, I only lost a hand," he said at the hospital, "My buddy lost his life."
  Pfc. Arthur Affeldt, of Alexander, Minn., had better luck in the fighting for the hill position on the second of February. Affeldt moved up with his unit, picked up a discarded grenade made of a TNT block, just in case he might need it. Advancing uphill, he was fired on by a Namboo, so he rolled to one side and continued to crawl upwards,
After ambushing a tank and truck convoy, a demolition squad of the Mars Task Force plants dynamite charges in an effort to further disrupt enemy traffic along the Burma Road, main escape route for Japanese retreating towards Lashio.
watching spurts of dirt follow him up the hill. He finally maneuvered behind a small ridge which protected him from fire, then crawled close enough to a pillbox to use the improvised grenade. He saw at least one dead Jap as he passed the position.

ANOTHER TEXAN
  Sgt. James L. Speck of McKinney, Tex., also did well with grenades in the same encounter. While the rest of his squad was pinned down by fire he circled a Jap position and neutralized it with a grenade, killing two Japs. A Namboo opened up on him not 10 feet away but he threw his grenade as he turned, killing a Jap and silencing the gun. He continued uphill another 30 yards, still under fire, and threw a grenade into another Jap position, getting two more Japs and knocking out another Namboo. As he threw this grenade, a Jap rifleman in a slit trench five yards away jumped up, fired at him, and missed. That gave Speck time to aim his carbine and kill another Jap. Pinned down once again by automatic weapons fire, Speck crawled to three men who had been wounded in the burst of fire, and rolled them down the hill out of range of the weapons. Here he gave them first aid and saw to it that they were evacuated. As the wounded were carried off Speck saw a man from an ammo pack train go down, shot by automatic weapons fire. Speck crawled over to him under fire and moved him out of danger, then administered first aid.

RECOMMENDED
  Following a reorganization of his platoon and re-issue of ammo, Speck went out again, this time with Lt. Thomas Farley, to take a large fortified position, apparently a Jap command post. Approaching from different angles, Speck and farley liquidated the men holding that position. When his outfit reached the objective the men came under sniper fire, so once again Speck became an aidman and evacuated more wounded under fire. He has been recommended for decoration and citation.
  Pfc. John Sebastian of St. Louis, Mo., a squad leader, found two of his men wounded beyond the perimeter, while his position was under fire. Directing the rest of the squad to concentrate their fire on a pillbox from which sniper fire was coming, Sebastian crawled out beyond the perimeter and hauled the two men back to safety and medical aid.
  Pvt. Robert Rymp of Topeka, Kans., made his attack standing up in the face of enemy fire, shooting a grease gun with one hand and tossing grenades with the other. Afterwards he said, "I was just doing what everybody else did." But his covering fire and the accuracy of his grenade throwing made possible the elimination of several Jap positions by men in his squad.



‘Isle Of Song’ Proves Big Hit In Assam Area
 By Pvt. IRVING MARDER   Roundup Field Correspondent

  APO 689 - The jackals stopped howling and listened. The spider monkey in the bamboo thicket cocked an inquisitive ear. The cheetah on the hillside paused in mid-prowl, his sensitive nose quivering. Could this be Assam - the steaming, sweltering, shivering, jumping-off place where only jungle characters live willingly?
  It was Assam - the heart of the Bamboo Circuit - and the unprecedented goings-on which befuddled Kipling's cousins were performances by the Isle of Song Company - officially known as USO Camp Show 420, now touring this Theater.

G.I.'s THAW
  The G.I.'s thawed like an ice cream cone under the Indian sun as the first lilting notes were sung. The show opens with piano selections by Rudolph Gruen, distinguished American concert pianist and composer who is a grandson of the famous watchmaker. Mr. Gruen has played more than 1,000 concerts in the U.S., Australia and Europe. He has appeared as soloist and accompanist with may world-famous symphonies.
  Rachel Van Cleve looks like Hollywood's conception of a leading soprano and sings like the Met's ideal diva. She is small, with the fragility of an ivory statuette. Having been on an earlier USO tour of the Pacific theater, she is the only overseas veteran in the troupe. Paul Althouse, longtime leading tenor of the Metropolitan Opera Company, described her voice as "the biggest coloratura I have ever heard." In addition to opera, she has sung for the concert stage, radio and oratorio.

TENOR PRAISED
  Frank Murray, tenor, who shepherds USO Camp Show 420 and emcees, has a voice which rang over the hills like a great bugle. Murray started his spectacular singing career as a boy soprano with the Met. When his voice changed he stayed on for five seasons as head of the boy's choir. He has appeared throughout the U.S. with the St. Louis Municipal Opera, the Boston Comic Opera Company, and with touring Gilbert and Sullivan troupes.
  Isabella Wilson, the show's striking contralto, is a Canadian who has scored her biggest successes in the States. She has sung at Radio City Music Hall and last summer appeared at the Paper Mill Playhouse in musical comedies including Sally, Blossom Time and The Merry Widow. Her version of Begin the Beguine is wonderful to see and hear.

SHOW'S BABY
  Emma Ricci - "Emmy" to the G.I.'s - is the baby of the show. At 20 she has played violin on big time circuits for many years. A sister of prodigy Ruggierio Ricci and five other musical brothers and sisters, Emmy appeared at 10 with the Long Island Symphony and at 14 with the N.Y.A. Orchestra.
  The Isle of Song company is scheduled for an extended tour of every bamboo grove and palmetto patch in the Bush League.



‘BY YOUR HAND’
  At Agra is a baksheesh-wise guide who makes a habit of stopping the G.I. visitors to the Taj Mahal and offering his blessing before the tomb of the old king and his favorite wife.
  The guide tried his favorite invocation this week on two Delhi Commando suckers. He started his familiar chant, "Something by your hand, sahibs. Something by your hand."
  T/5 Juan Elosua painfully dragged out his last rupee, laid it on the hand of the guide and received the blessing. T/5 Charles P. Cicio, who didn't possess a rupee or anything near one, thoughtfully plucked the Elosua contribution back and laid it again on the hand of the astonished guide, with the remark, "Something by the hand."
  He got the blessing.
B-29 Crewmen Get Eight Nips;
Cited By LeMay


    XX BOMBER COMMAND B-29 BASE, INDIA - For the manner in which they fought off more than 30 attacking Jap fighters, destroying eight in a 1,200-mile running battle, crew members of a B-29 photo reconnaissance plane have been cited by their former commanding general, Maj. Gen. Curtis E. LeMay.
  The aerial flight, most spectacular example to date of the deadly effectiveness of the B-29's central fire control system, occurred during a photographic mission over Omura, Japan.
  The Super-Fort, piloted by Maj. John C. Eigenmann, Springfield, Ill., was attacked by enemy fighters from the time it started across the Yellow Sea to the Japanese mainland until it returned to occupied China.
  Of approximately 100 fighters seen, more than 30 attacked the lone B-29, and eight fighters were destroyed and one probably destroyed. The Super-Fort returned to its Western China base undamaged.
  The crewmen, members of a B-29 group commanded by Col. William H. Blanchard, and the decorations awarded them follow:
  S/Sgt. Clifford A. Bell, tail gunner, DFC; S/Sgt. John K. Jensen, Jr., senior gunner, DFC; Sgt. David F. Lagoy, right gunner, DFC; Cpl. William L. Douglas, left gunner, DFC; Lt. William E. Baker, co-pilot, Air Medal; Lt. Donald L. Janasak, navigator, Air Medal; Lt. Michael Knezevich, flight engineer, Bronze Oak Leaf Cluster to the Air Medal; T/Sgt. Samuel Sill, aerial observer, Bronze Oak Leaf Cluster to the Air Medal; S/Sgt. Marion T. Disbennett, radio operator, Bronze Oak Leaf Cluster to the Air Medal.



YE ED INVADES STILWELL’S OFFICE,
FINDS GENERAL HASN'T CHANGED

  By CAPT. FLOYD WALTER   Roundup Editor

  WASHINGTON - Warm sunshine streamed through the tall windows on two sides of the room and bathed the trim figure sitting before the desk.
  Then Gen. Joseph W. Stilwell glanced up suddenly from his work as newly-appointed commander of the Army Ground Forces, arose from his chair and extended his hand.
  The handshake was warm; "Uncle Joe," you observed, looked lithe and fit at 62. His eyes tingled and the lines of his face were transformed into that of familiar smile, compounded half of good humor and half quizzical interest.
  Conversation was brief for in 10 minutes the General had a date. Maj. Emmett Thiessen, his pilot in the CBI, was waiting at the airport. Uncle Joe's Chariot, his personal C-47, now minus CBI insignia, was poised for a hop to the Southern States for a whirlwind inspection tour.
  But "Uncle Joe," of course, could spare a moment for a few words with a visitor from the Far East. But most of the pleasantries exchanged wouldn't hold much interest for you. "Uncle Joe" is still observing the silence of the Sphinx concerning his recall from the Far East. Only once did he let his hair down, and that was when he said, "I'm sorry not to be around over there to finish the job."
  Soon "uncle Joe" moved swiftly down the hall, members of his staff hurrying to follow his brisk Infantryman's stride.
  The incongruity of his setting in Washington is striking. The wiry, tireless field soldier was here, there and everywhere in the Burma jungle as his mixed forces slugged their way through the Hukawng and Mogaung Valleys and finally wrested Myitkyina from the Japanese after a bitter struggle.
  The General now accepts a sacrosanct office in the Army War College Headquarters. Clerks tiptoe softly through the halls of the ancient red brick building.
  Yet "uncle Joe" hasn't changed. McNair and Ben Lear before him were strict disciplinarians, but Stilwell boldly has shattered precedent by flitting through offices in strictly informal style. For the first few days office staffs jumped to their feet and snapped to ramrod attention, as is the custom, until the General informed them to continue with their business.
  Around his red brick house on Officers Row the General relaxes with his two aides, Majs. Carl Arnold and Dick Young, who were with him in CBI. There they batch, and Arnold not infrequently applies his skill with the skillet on such homely bits as an egg sandwich.
  "Uncle Joe's" famous campaign hat has been retired, now that the General is no longer fighting the war in the field. It holds an honored place in the house but will only gather dust until or if he returns to combat.
  Stilwell's job is to organize, train and equip all the Ground Forces for action on all Allied fighting fronts. When Germany falls his will be the problem of redeployment of the forces in Europe for the climatic battles of the war against the Japanese. Whether he will assume a field command when the China coast is invaded is a matter of considerable conjecture around Washington.
  Stilwell spent his first 10 days in office acquainting himself with his office chores. Now he has started to hop into Uncle Joe's Chariot to observe the progress in the far flung training areas.
  As you would expect, he has forbidden that he be greeted by brass bands and brass hats. "Just send a car to the airfield," he has requested, "Don't stop your program."
  Often garbed in fatigues and wearing an overseas cap cocked over one ear, he plunges into his inspection tour with the same vigor with which he directed the North Burma campaign.
  According to his aides, the General continues to receive numerous letters from officers and men in China, India and Burma. These he answers faithfully. He works long hours, with few outside interests. For mental relaxation he has attended a few ice hockey games.
  He has given only one press conference. This was attended by Darrell Berrigan, veteran United Press war correspondent who suffered with Stilwell during the Burma campaign of 1942, and who was by the General's side when he was shelled during the 1944 campaign. Berrigan merged himself inconspicuously into the rear of the room. When the question period arrived he fired a verbal shot at "Uncle Joe." "That's Berrigan," the General said.
  Cocking his head, he jokingly remarked that Berrigan had a helluva nerve, observing that the correspondent knew the answer as well as he did.


HAWK MAN
Meet Maj. Everett W. Bennett, post dental officer of the 1345th AAF Base Unit.  His dental equipment has not arrived so he has become "hawk scarer away" for the unit.  The hawks have been dive-bombing G.I.'s mess kits, grabbing what they can get.

Dentist Retains Civilian Hobby

  1345TH AAF BASE UNIT, INDIA - Although the Army encourages men to continue civilian hobbies while in the service, there are only a few cases on record where a man is ordered to continue a hobby. At this base, just this has happened to Maj. Everett W. Bennett, Post Dental Officer, of Peoria, Ill., whose hobby of small game hunting is being used to good advantage to keep marauding hawks at a fair distance from the mess line.
  Inquiring into this unusual occupation for a dental officer, it was discovered that the dental equipment for this base has not arrived as yet, and to pass the time he has taken on the additional duty at the request of Lt. Col. Silas A. Morehouse, commanding officer.
  Before Bennett took over with the Winchester, the scavengers had inflicted a few wounds on unwary G.I's, one man losing most of his ear as a hawk came too close in its effort to grab a square meal. A decrease in the number of accidents shows that Bennett's anti-aircraft work is effective, but to date, the stock of the Winchester is free of notches.
  It seems there is a stiff fine imposed on people who shoot "kites" in India, so Bennett explains the smoothness of the stock by saying, "I don't try to kill the hawks. Just try to keep them up where they can't do any harm." Let's hope he can do better shooting in Illinois. - SGT. FRANK CLARK.


ASC Mechanics Go With P-38 ‘Twin Dragons’

  AIR SERVICE COMMAND BASE, INDIA - It was moving day along the Arakan coast recently and the men of Col. Douglas Johnston's Air Service Group pitched in to assist the aerial fighters of Maj. Veri D. Luehrang's "Twin Dragons," famous decimators of the red meat ball airplanes. Associated with the "Twin Dragons" off and on for more than a year in the India-Burma Theater, the Air Service Command mechanic-commandos decided not to shed tears when the P-38 outfit moved up into a forward base in the wake of the conquering Allied land forces.
  Instead, they got their trustworthy C-47 Dinah Might and their B-25 Heaven's Above and their C-64 among other kites, dropped in on the Major and chucked the trappings of a first-class air umbrella into the fuselages.

REBUILT DISCARD
  Flying the Heaven's Above, which is a rebuilt discard fugitive from the Air Commandos bomber gang, was Capt. Charles L. Davis, Lakeland, Fla., a flying engineering officer who has logged as many hours as the average transport or bomber pilot in Asia.
  Monitoring the Moving Day chores, Davis was assisted by W/O C. M. Weddle of Bakersfield, Calif.; T/Sgt. William W. Barnes, Caldwell, N.J.; Lt. A. V. Fidrocki, Boston; Lt. B. C. Wariner, Ft. Worth, Tex.; S/Sgt. D. F. Winchester, Baltimore, Md., and Pfc. J. A. Heaney, Flushing, Long Island, N.Y.
  Looking out of his bamboo matting quarters, Luehrang, a Leavenworth, Kans., husky who has given the "Dragons" Terry and the Pirates type of leadership, with numerous kills, stated, "It's tough to pull stakes, but we hope we have to do it often."

HAND-PICKED
  Advance detachments of the Air Service Group, specialists in third echelon repair and supply, ordnance and communications, have already moved up in support of the Arakan campaign and taken their tent and basha quarters at airstrips. Each man in an advanced detachment is a hand-picked expert in several lines.
  Among those going in by air in a typical strip shipment were Sgts. Ernest M. Wright, Duchesne, Utah; Irving Polakoff, Philadelphia; Roy Chapman, Philadelphia; Cpl. Archie Simmers, Canton, Ohio; Sgts. Robert Stoll, Portland, Ore.; Francis J. Frier, Elizabeth, N.J.; S/Sgt. George V. Moncure, Oakland, Calif.; Sgt. Louis Pereiz, Brooklyn, N.Y.; Sgt. Michael L. Jannantuone, Baltimore, Md., and Pfc. Michael J. Bubacz, Duluth, Minn.


HAY-HIDDEN  SKY  GIANT
Crew members of the Super-Fortress Lassie, aided by Chinese, are shown camouflaging the bomber at an emergency field behind the fluid Jap lines in China.  Hidden by clay and rice straw, the big plane was repaired and flown to its XX Bomber Command Base after five days, being literally snatched from the Japs' very nose.  The plane since has been retired from combat and is now in the States.  The crew is flying Lassie II.

B-29, Crippled Behind
Enemy Lines, Returns

By T/SGT. JOSEPH SANTLEY
Roundup Field Correspondent

  XX BOMBER COMMAND, B-29 BASE, INDIA - The story of how the Super-Fortress Lassie came home after a five-day emergency sojourn at an isolated airfield behind the fluid Jap lines in China has been disclosed here.
  Aided by Chinese troops, the crew camouflaged the bomber with clay and rice straw, repaired it as Jap aircraft vainly searched for the carefully concealed plane, and later flew it to safety.
  Lassie, piloted by Capt. Harold L. Meints of Grand Mound, Ia., was returning from a XX Bomber Command mission when loss of an engine and a diminishing fuel supply necessitated an emergency landing.
  "We let down through 10,000 feet of solid soup and squeezed past some high hills to land at the field," Meints related.
  To hide the conspicuous silver bombers from the eyes of Jap "Photo Joe" reconnaissance planes and strafing fighters, the crew, aided by 100 Chinese, daubed the shining fuselage with dull clay and spread rice straw across the top.
  "To blend the plane with the rice paddies, some of the boys stacked small bundles of rice along the wings and arranged them as though they were planted in furrows," Meints said.
  Tools and spare parts were flown into the field along with the crew chief, M/Sgt. Edward H. Lehmann, Eagle Bend, Minn., and the crew alternately worked on the plane and scattered for cover as Jap planes roared nearby searching for the bomber.
  "A low ceiling hung over the field most of the time and the Japs never did locate us," the pilot added.
  Three C-47 Skytrains hauled thousands of gallons of gasoline in barrels to the field. The fuel was pumped into the bomber by hand.
  Five days later the plane was stripped of its camouflage and flown to its Billy Mitchell Group base in Western China, literally snatched right out from under the Japs' noses.
  "I guess they would have liked to grab a B-29 intact," Meints said. "But we thought of that, too. We had parked Lassie over a 1,000-pound bombe and would have blown her sky high if the Japs had threatened the field."
  Other members of Lassie's crew who participated in the mission are:
  Lts. William C. Shirar, Lehighton, Penn., copilot; Francis McCann, Jr., Maplewood, N.J., bombardier; Willard Holderby, Byron, Okla., navigator; F/O Henry F. Schultze, New Haven, Conn., flight engineer; Sgt. Henry M. Compton, the Bronx, New York City, special radioman; S/Sgt. Glenn R. Muir, Union, N.Y., radio operator; T/Sgt. William Egan, Bridgeport, Conn., senior gunner; S/Sgt. Thomas J. Murray, Newburgh, N.Y., left gunner; Sgt. Edwin L. Sullins, Red Rock, Okla., right gunner; and S/Sgt. William M. Foley, Ridge Spring, S.C., tail gunner.



FUNZAFIRE ???
  Dear Roundup:  This week Benny Meroff and his Funzafire unit arrived in the area scheduled to do one show on each of two consecutive nights and to rest on the third day. Most of the show units which play this area, G.I. or civilian, have been tickled silly to put on a few acts or even a full show at the hospital for the patients, so we felt sure that we could ask for at least a part of the show for a little while on the afternoon of the second day. Nay sahib! Benny and his gang were "tired." When our unit Special Service Officer and our Red Cross hospital worker visited him to try to convince him, he became very insulting. he told them we didn't have it so tough in Indian and that we really didn't need shows like his. He invited them to send in a report to Special Service at Base Section, adding "I have so many good reports that a bad one or two won't hurt me any."
  I'm not squawking personally. I saw and enjoyed the show on the first night. Maybe we didn't need the show. But we've got a lot of guys in bed who are in the hospital because they have been working too hard for too long and are all worn out and need a good show once in a while. Maybe Benny doesn't know that's why the USO hired him.
  I nominate Benny Meroff for (censored)!
  Remember fellows - we've got it easy in India; Benny Meroff said so. - 1st Sgt. George M. Leonard. - Hospital.

WE DON'T BELIEVE IT
  Dear Roundup:  Here in a part of India where the days are very hot and the nights extremely cold, I work as a crew chief on a jeep.
  The other night, just before supper, I put my jeep into an Indian's stable, inasmuch as the forecasters had promised an unusually cold night. After chow I went out and tied a blanket snugly over the hood.
  The next morning it was still extremely cold so I left the blanket on the radiator. Starting down the road I heard a loud buzzing from the engine and the jeep took off into the air. Startled to say the least, I shut off the engine and soon glided to earth. Anxious to get away from the haunted area, I started up again with the same results.
  This time I was determined to get to the bottom of this unusual phenomenon, so I tore the blanket from its place and quickly lifted the hood. There, to my amazement, were what appeared to be thousands of dead flies.
  After much deliberation, I came to this conclusion: Putting the jeep into the stable, a natural haunt of flies, the still warm engine had drawn the flies as a magnet. As the engine became warm again in the morning, they were revived, and the blanket prevented their escape. With the tremendous lifting power of these thousands of flies, the light jeep had soon been lifted into the air, without the aid of propeller or wings.
  With the development of an adequate refrigeration and heating system under the hood of the jeep, the once useless fly mighty easily become an important weapon of this war. - Pfc. F. W. Crawford.



BLOODY GOOD SHOW
 By SGT. EDDIE ZACHARIAH

  Ripley's Believe It or Not has nothing on Sgt. Lincoln Heller's recent experience while flying as an aerial radio operator with a Troop Carrier Squadron of the 10th Air Force. And Heller, who dares anyone to refute what he witnessed, believe this to be the most humorous incident ever to arise out of this Theater of Operations.
  During the airborne invasion of Burma, Heller was flying on a mission, the purpose of which was to drop some British paratroopers at dusk on a pin-point objective in Burma. The target was sighted by the pilot, who told the British to prepare to jump. But jumping out of a plane 3,000 feet above the ground is not a trifling matter, particularly if one doesn't know where he is jumping.
  One red-faced little lad looked down but couldn't make out the target in the gathering darkness.
  "Deah me," he said, "it's dashedly difficult to see what's down there, isn't it?"
  "Why not try using a monocle, old chap," Heller laughed, not knowing that the paratrooper was within hand's reach of one. The Britsher thought a minute, reached into his pocket, drew out a monocle, placed it in position and remarked cheerily, "Dashed if it isn't a good idea."
  A few seconds later, the jump buzzer sounded, and the last time Heller saw the paratrooper was when he was leaping out of the plane with the monocle still clinging to his eye.



Yank Ingenuity Develops Three Tire-Bead Tools

  Three separate Air Transport Command bases have newly-invented tire-bead breakers to separate the tire from the wheel rim.
  At 1347th BU, S/Sgt. Pearlie Tatum of Elizabethtown, N.C., has found the right answer in a homemade invention that works even when the high landing speeds have vulcanized the beads to the wheels.
  At BU 1327, Pfc. Roosevelt Moore has another tire bead-roller. Moore has fashioned a treadmill-like arrangement which rolls and unrolls the bead of the tire from the flange of the wheel. He has also invented a device to remove the tube.
  The 1339th BU owes a cutdown on time from between an hour and an hour and a half to three minutes in removing the tire from the rim, thanks to Pfc. Sam Skurow of Cincinnati and Pfc. Charles Foster of Marion, Ohio.


POSTWAR JEEP
The boys of a motor repair unit with the Eighth USAAF show the jeep before and after.  At top the military version, and bottom, after they had assemble sundry parts for their version of what it will look like when they take the neighborhood blonde out for a drive down Lovers Lane after Hitler and Hirohito have been given the gong.

Bards Of Assam Loftily
Instruct At University


  ATC BASE, ASSAM - The twist of playing up a U.S. Armed Forces Institute program as a college is not new - the practice is common among Assam bases. What is unusual is the unadulterated gall of the 1328th AAF Base Unit in not only going all out by affixing to their program the sacrosanct title of 'University,' but openly boasting that graduates from other base 'colleges' and 'academies' could apply for admission to Assam University at the completion of their studies in the lower seats of learning.
  With the supreme impudence of an upstart, a bunch of the boys at 1328th blithely announced this week the 'incorporation' of their 'university;' cockily designated Sgt. Robert J. Cahill, former Boston College teacher as president of Assam University; gave Sgt. Joseph C. Nappi, who holds a Masters degree from Ohio State, the job of registrar with additional duties as dean of women.

NO 'UNDERTAKING'
  Pointing to the fact that 15 percent of the base already is enrolled in either a self-teaching or a group study course, Assam U. boasts a curriculum that embraces almost everything from rudimentary reading and writing to the most profound college courses. The only course not available to G.I.'s so far is the one requested by several would-be morticians - Undertaking.
  However, on all other counts the University has been able to meet the demand: Cahill teaches Beginner's German. T/Sgt. Lucas D. Gonzales of the El Paso Technical Institute teaches physics; Pfc. Jesse W. Tennison, who taught radio and flew for Pan-American Airlines teaches radio; Cpl. Walter C. Strongstreet, an accountant, is the University's professor of bookkeeping and accounting and Pfc. William E. Moss, a chemical engineer, is mathematics and science professor.
  A former mess hall has been converted into a classroom complete with blackboard, desks and chairs and is used day and night by the ever-expanding University.

ELECTRICITY
  Colorful and unorthodox Robert Hutchins of the University of Chicago has nothing on either of the two enterprising Sgts. Cahill and Gonzales. The latter carries his own laboratory to his classes in electricity. One of his pets is a cut-away wet cell battery which he uses in his demonstrations. In addition, he adjourns his class to various spots on the base for realistic demonstrations of generators, wiring techniques, etc., actually in operation.
  The indomitable Irishman, Cahill, absolutely refuses to be stumped when the generator which supplies power for classroom lighting goes out and takes his illumination with it. He simply pulls a switch from writing German conjugations, or whatever the class is doing at the time, to pronunciation exercises, basing the switch on the accepted theory of blocking out all senses but those actually involved in the thing being learned.
  Assam U. may not be as chip-heavy as Vassar or as urbane as Harvard, but these guys take their spare-time learning seriously.
  Courses in German, algebra, bookkeeping, physics and radio are in operation now; geometry, French, Spanish, psychology, and advertising are a few of the subjects in process of organization.
  Registrar of the University is ensconced in a section of the Service Club library amid a combined Orientation and USAFI display.



SEAC’s Phoenix To Start Feb. 24

  Phoenix, a new publication for the troops in India and Burma will make its debut this week, Feb. 24.
  Phoenix is a weekly picture magazine, published by the Southeast Asia Command, under a joint British-American editorial staff, and will be available to all Allied Forces in Southeast Asia Command, and in the I-B Theater.
  In general appearance, Phoenix resembles Life, having the same format. Editorial content will be for the most part pictures, covering the local scene, troop activities, and news pictures from the home fronts.
  Writer-camera teams, both British and American, will cover the fighting fronts and will deliver weekly reports, pictorial and text, as American, British, and Allied Forces push the attack against the Japs. Regular features will include an exclusive Washington letter, American sports pictures, and pictorial news features.
  Phoenix will be on sale at G.I. PX's beginning Saturday, at 8 annas per copy.
  Originally conceived by Gen. Joseph W. Stilwell and Lord Louis Mountbatten, Phoenix has been in preparation for a number of months. The co-editors are Capt. Ian Coster, Royal Marines, and Capt. Crosby Maynard, USAAF, formerly associate editor of Roundup.



Super-Fort Modifications Made Between Combat Missions

  20TH BOMBER COMMAND BASE, INDIA - Of the Army's B-29 Super-Fortress, it has been said that it was the first plane in aviation history to go directly from the drawing table into combat. When the Air Force called for a bomber to carry the war to Japan before the end of the long, bitter road of island-hopping was reached, there was not time for the usual extensive tests. Super-Forts were needed in a hurry; they were provided.
  Much of the experimentation which all new weaponsmust undergo, was made on the B-29 in combat. Modification was accomplished between missions. The only way this could be possible was through the closest teamwork between personnel of the air service and maintenance stations in the United States, and personnel of the 20th Bomber Command in this Theater of Operations.
  Pilots and crews, flying B-29's deep into the vitals of Japan, carried destruction to industrial and military centers long before the time-table of the Japanese General Staff gave them any right to be there. And always, over the target, on the long flights back to their India and China bases, crews observed the performance of their airplanes as carefully as the mother robin watches her young on the first test flight. Each kink was pounced upon, tabulated, recorded. Some were ironed out at the Bomber Command's Air Depot, others forwarded to the tables and workbenches of the experts at factories and experimental stations in the States. The experts fired back their answers in modifications. The Super-Fort grew as it flew.
  One of the first major problems discovered under combat test was the serious overheating of the big 2,250-horsepower Wright engines designed to pull the great bomb-load on the long run to Japan. Though the Super-Forts were doing an excellent job, the lif expectancy of the engines and the frequency of necessary changes threatened to reduce the striking power and effectiveness of the airplane. Overheating, it was discovered, was caused in insufficient lubrication and mis-directed air-flow. It was a big problem, and it called for a quick answer.
  At the direction of Lt. Gen. Barney M. Giles, Chief of Air Staff, two Army engineering experts were appointed to supervise a program of research at Oklahoma City Air Depot. It was their job to arrive at some method of engine modernization which could be adopted without changing existing technical plans and which could be adopted in the field, without interruption of combat missions. The Army's experts were Col. Erik H. Nelson and Lt. Col. Harry V. Hubbard, both technical advisors to Gen. Hap Arnold.
  The entire Depot of the Oklahoma City Air technical Command and its personnel were put at their disposal. After six weeks of intensive work, they arrived at the answer. The huge engines were modernized by baffling cylinders and installing ducted baffles to provide proper distribution of air and to improve cooling. Crossover tubes were installed between rocker boxes to furnish the needed lubrication. Rocker arms were reworked, drilled and gouged out to allow free passage of oil. Nacelles were modified by shortening the cowl flaps, which increased the air flow and reduced drag. The two upper flaps which had been fixed in position, were made moveable to reduce drag further.
  Results were startling. The Super-Fort's amazingly high speed, comparative to the swiftness expected only of fighter planes, could be maintained with reduced power settings, and fuel consumption was thus reduced considerably. A "guinea-pig" ship was modified for exhibition at other depots in the United States as a model for personnel who would have the job of making similar modifications on other Super-Forts.
  In Oklahoma, work was started on a series of combat planes ready to receive the engine and nacelle modernizations. First ship to roll off the line was B-29 No. 265208. The combat crew took her over, named her "Andy's Dandy," and took off for an Air Depot of the 20th Bomber Command in India. To this Air Depot also came Nelson and his staff, to supervise the important job of modification which the Depot was to undertake.
  Under Col. Arthur V. Jones, Jr., Depot Commander, and Lt. Col. Ainsley E. Stuart, Depot Chief of Maintenance, mechanics and engine specialists started work on the Wright engines and the nacelles. New engines are placed on combat planes between missions. Total completion of all modifications is now being neared, and results are encouraging.
  The India-Burma Theater, as well as the China area, is marked by great supply difficulties and operational hazards. In the face of such difficulties, the conservation of vitally-needed fuel and the longer life of Super-Fort engines, bring tremendous advancement to a deadly weapon carrying the battle to Japan and victorious conclusion of the war months earlier than would otherwise have been possible. Credit teamwork - the men overseas and the men and women at home, working together towards a speedy victory.


HOW IT LOOKS OUTSIDE
Here's a 75mm cannon before it is fitted into the nose of a B-25.  Left to right, forming the ASC crew that made the potent .75 a part of the plane are Sgt. Morris E. Hienseley, Carbon Hill, Ala.; Sgt. Emil Pomykacz, Chicago, and Pfc. Renato E. Agleitti of New York City.

Roundup Experts Pick
Best  In  Pulchritude


  The Roundup promised to bring you this week a list of the 10 most beautiful women and the 10 most handsome men as picked by our own India-Burma experts.
  It might be recalled that a sculptor and a sculptress, whose names escape us at the moment gave their selections last week, with a list of reasons such as he looks like "Hermes by Praxiteles," etc., far into the night.
  Cpl. Ted Sally, known to the boys in the back room as "The Mustache," selects the women. Sally, just back from sketching the Mars Task Force and the first convoy to China, worked with Paramount Studios in Hollywood before he became a lucky G.I.
  Here are his selections, with the reasons appended. Sally confesses he knows nothing about Hermes by Praxiteles, but he does know a good looking dame when he sees one.

THE WOMEN
  Ingrid Bergman - "What a face, what a profile, ah, whatta figger." (The Roundup is not responsible for Sally's spelling.)
  Linda Darnell - "She's built like a house of bricks."
  Maria Montez - "She must have something. Did you ever see the way the Indian baksheesh wallahs flock to the cinema when she's squirming on the screen?"
  Ingrid Bergman - "She's worth a repeat in any league."
  Esther Williams - "You don't need a reason for picking this dish. Besides, she can swim."
  Rita Hayworth - "Ah, that lucky Orson Welles."
  Sona Osata - "So petite to the eye she'd give any 4-F 20-20 vision."
  Jane Russell - "Grrr"
  Lois Sally - "My wife. Hell, fellows, I expect to go home some day, comes rotation some day. And to her, not Bergman or Hedy."

NO WONDER JAPS LOSE
No wonder the Japs are losing the war.  Just take a gander at what the Nips use for pinups.  The morale of any army is bound to go to hell if this is the best they can do.  This picture was seized in a Japanese dugout on a Pacific island, where it had been decorating the wall.  It was the spoil of a Chicago marine who mailed it home.  You can see to what depths the Roundup cheesecake file has fallen.  Loosen up and send some in.

  As for the men's list we decided it would be unfair to hold one American gal over here to a choice of only 10 males what with all the brass they have at their finger tips.
  So we polled six Yankee gals, with the proviso beforehand that they could not nominate any of their favorite brass. Ah, comes demobilization.
  So here's the composite list. The gals prefer to remain anonymous. But they want it to be known that they can assign just as scientific reasons as the sculptress who gave her best 10 last week.

THE MEN
  Lord Louis Mountbatten - "Jack Armstrong's only rival."
  Clark Gable - "Whose ears have the vigorous cut-down appeal of birds-on-the-wing."
  Charles Boyer - "Has that certain something known as "Je ne sais quoi," (Roundup's French expert has boomeranged to the States for a 30-day deal, so you'll have to figure it out yourself!)
  Cordell Hull - "Whose cornerstone appearance puts him in solid."
  Tyrone Power - "The eyes have it."
  Marshal Tito - "Good geological formation."
  Anthony Eden - "He dude it."
  Len Chaney -"For that mysterious charm of the unknown."
  Sad Sack - "For his winsomeness."
  Maurice Tillet, the French Angel - "Massive masculinity."
  Well, as the second looey who landed in India told his MP's, "This is it."



THE ROAD FORECAST

  WASHINGTON - (UP) - Rep. Mike Mansfield (D.-Mont.) reporting on his China trip said this week that supplies will be moving over the Stilwell Road at the rate of 100,000 tons monthly.
36TH REPELS JAP ATTACKS AT MYITSON

  GEN. SULTAN'S HQ., NORTH BURMA - Japanese troops have heavily counter-attacked elements of Maj. Gen. Francis W. Festing's 36th British Division in their newly captured town of Myitson on the north bank of the Shweli River.
  Nip forces counter-attacked from the south, and the momentum of their assault carried them through British lines to the river. But the tough fighting men of Festing repulsed the Japs and after several hours of heavy fighting, more than 200 enemy dead were counted on the field.
  Festing is regrouping his units in Myitson and consolidating positions there as heavy fighting continues to the northwest.
  Earlier in the week, Chinese First Army troops occupied the Burma Road town of Kutkai, 50 miles north of Lashio. The Chinese are halfway from the Ledo-Burma Road junction at Mong-Yu and Lashio, terminus of the old Burma Road.
  The Chinese are heading towards Hsenwi. American and Chinese tank units under command of Col. Rothwell Brown encountered an enemy group and after knocking out a tank and two tankettes, drove the Nips towards Hsenwi.
  The American forces of the Mars task Force of Brig. Gen. Willey were last reported in action towards Lashio but there was no news of their further progress this week.



EAC Planes Hit Burma, Siam

  HQ., EASTERN AIR COMMAND - Big bombers and broken bridges dominated the news of Eastern Air Command operations the past week as RAF Liberators and U.S. B-24's of the Strategic Air Force knocked out numerous spans and by-passes in Burma and Siam.
  The most successful attack was that which wrecked the 1,100-foot bridge at Kanchanaburi, the longest on the Burma-Siam railway. Its destruction has seriously crippled the vital Japanese supply line between Bangkok and Moulmein.
  Other RAF Libs "completely obliterated" a large section of the railway line near the Burma-Siam border. Earlier, the viaduct at Khao Phra, also on the Burma-Siam line, was considerably damaged. On the Kra Isthmus railroad sidings were torn up by U.S. heavy bombers.
  In a co-ordinated attack with XX Bomber Command Super-Forts, EAC heavies blasted great enemy stores areas near Rangoon in the heaviest bombing attack ever launched in the Theater. Seven hundred tons of high explosives and incendiaries set fire to great quantities of petrol, oil and ammunition. Two enemy fighters were shot down in this raid.


  Bull Sheet, snappy and informative little journal put out by and for the Ramgarh Training Center, has been "put to bed" for the last time. After more than two years of publication, a period which saw it grow from a two-page mimeographed newsletter to a 16-page tabloid, the paper has finally been forced to close its doors, due to paper shortage and other difficulties. Maj. Carl Arnold was the father of the Bull Sheet. Other editors were Capts. Robert McGinnis and Robert Berg, Lt. Bill Cox, Col. Robert Wheeler, and the last incumbent, Pfc. John J. Cooks.
  Way back in 1942 at a basic training camp in Miami, Recruit Walt Schwartz borrowed three bucks from fellow recruit Joe Kriegler. Next day Joe was shipped out, minus his dollars three. This week - almost two years later - the debt was finally paid, when Schwartz, contact man for G.I. shows touring the I-B, ran into creditor Kriegler in the Special Services Office, 1345th AAF Base Unit, India. After usual polite amenities, the debt was recalled (by Kriegler) and Schwartz forked over Rs. 10.
  Pvt. Jim Salisbury, now stationed "somewhere in Burma," can rest assured that the gal he left behind back in Milwaukee, Wis., is a female faithful and true. A clipping from the Milwaukee Journal arrived this week, telling how Jim's one and only, Co-ed Margaret Severns, University of Wisconsin, recently :picketed" the junior prom. Margaret, bless her, walked around the campus carrying this sign: "No Prom For Me. My Guy's In Burma."
  Cribbage players, please note. Col. C. W. Hanna write in from APO 629 that one recent night while playing a two-handed cribbage game, he was dealt the "perfect hand" - Jack of Diamonds, fives of Spades, Hearts and Clubs and the five of Diamonds was turned in. The colonel says it's the first time he's ever seen it happen, and he wonders what the chances are of holding it again.
  Besides making rice paddies out of Jap-occupied hills in Burma, "Earthquakers" (12th Bomb Gp., 10th Air Force) are also dabbling in psychological warfare against the enemy. In one six month period, they showered enemy-held territory with 4,091,300 propaganda leaflets, which told of the Allies' progress in the European war and also in the Far East. Success of this campaign is shown in the statement of a recently-liberated Burmese native: "Encouragement from the leaflets dropped to us was the only thing that kept us going - living for the day of Allied liberation."
  Neil McDowell Gilliam, volunteer driver in an American Field Ambulance Unit, has been awarded the British George Meda, for his "devotion to duty" in evacuating wounded from the Palel-Tamu Road area under heavy enemy fire. "His one thought was to render the maximum aid to the wounded," read his citation, "and to do this he was willing to face any risk . . his complete disregard for the heaviest fire while carrying out his self-imposed task had a most heartening effect of the men."
  Five mechanics of an Airdrome Squadron assigned to a 10th Air Force Combat Cargo unit at APO 216 are claiming a new record for "engine change." They recently pulled a "complete engine change" on a C-47 in five hours and 55 minutes are willing to back this effort against any that anybody can offer. These "speed demons" were S/Sgt. Paul A. Florence, Sgts. Sylvis Gendron, William T. Towry, and Cpls. Henry F. Finnery and Harry A. Marsh.
  "Burma Banshees'" newest second lieutenant is also one of the outfit's "oldest" members. He's Raymond L. Kent, just recently advanced fro tech sergeant to a Medical Administrative shavetail by direct commission. Kent was assigned to the 80th Fighter Group, 10th Air Force, when it was first activated at Selfridge Field, Mich., in July 1941. He has served the Banshees' aches and pains ever since and is now Group Medic Administrative officer.



The Roundup is a weekly newspaper of the United States Forces, published by and for the men in Burma and India, from news and pictures supplied by staff members, soldier correspondents, United Press, OWI, and Army News Service. The Roundup is published Thursday of each week and is printed by The Statesman in New Delhi and Calcutta, India. Editorial matter should be sent directly to Capt. Floyd Walter, Hq., U.S.F., I.B.T., New Delhi, India, and should arrive not later than Sunday in order to be included in that week's issue. Pictures must arrive by Saturday and must be negatives or enlargements. Stories should contain full name and organization of sender. Complaints about circulation should be sent directly to Lt. S.R. Rose, Hq., U.S.F., I.B.T., New Delhi, India. Units on the mailing list should make notification of any major change in personnel strength or any change of APO.











  FEBRUARY  22,  1945  

Adapted from original issues of IBT Roundup shared by Greg Clark and Linda James

Copyright © 2009 Carl Warren Weidenburner






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