Myitkyina Airport is an airport in

Myitkyina Myitkyina (, ; (Eng; ''mitchinar'') Jinghpaw: ''Myitkyina'', ) is the capital city of Kachin State in Myanmar (Burma), located from Yangon, and from Mandalay. In Burmese it means "near the big river", and Myitkyina is on the west bank of the ...

Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John C. Wells, Joh ...

Airlines and destinations

History

Built before

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

as Myitkyina Airfield, the airfield was captured by the

Imperial Japanese Army The was the official ground-based armed force of the Empire of Japan from 1868 to 1945. It was controlled by the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff Office and the Ministry of the Army, both of which were nominally subordinate to the Emperor o ...

on 8 May 1942 during the

Japanese conquest of Burma The Japanese invasion of Burma was the opening phase of the Burma campaign in the South-East Asian theatre of World War II, which took place over four years from 1942 to 1945. During the first year of the campaign (December 1941 to mid-1942) ...

. During the occupation, it was used by the Japanese Air Force as a fighter base, attacking Allied aircraft flying "

the Hump The Hump was the name given by Allied pilots in the Second World War to the eastern end of the Himalayan Mountains over which they flew military transport aircraft from India to China to resupply the Chinese war effort of Chiang Kai-shek and t ...

" transport supply missions between

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

and

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

. The airfield was attacked on numerous missions by

Tenth Air Force The Tenth Air Force (10 AF) is a unit of the U.S. Air Force, specifically a numbered air force of the Air Force Reserve Command (AFRC). 10 AF is headquartered at Naval Air Station Fort Worth Joint Reserve Base/Carswell Field (formerly Carswell AF ...

and

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

fighter and bombers until it was captured by

Merrill's Marauders Merrill’s Marauders (named after Frank Merrill) or Unit ''Galahad'', officially named the 5307th Composite Unit (Provisional), was a United States Army long range penetration special operations jungle warfare unit, which fought in the Southe ...

(officially named the 6th Ranger Battalion-5307th Composite Unit (provisional)) on 17 May 1944, but fighting continued in Myitkyina town until August 1944. Once in Allied hands, the 3d Combat Cargo Group moved in with

C-47 Skytrain The Douglas C-47 Skytrain or Dakota (Royal Air Force, RAF, Royal Australian Air Force, RAAF, Royal Canadian Air Force, RCAF, Royal New Zealand Air Force, RNZAF, and South African Air Force, SAAF designation) is a airlift, military transport ai ...

s and used Myitkyina as a combat resupply airfield, air-dropping pallets of supplies and ammunition to the advancing Allied forces on the ground. In January 1945, the

80th Fighter Group 8 (eight) is the natural number following 7 and preceding 9. In mathematics 8 is: * a composite number, its proper divisors being , , and . It is twice 4 or four times 2. * a power of two, being 2 (two cubed), and is the first number of t ...

flew

P-47 Thunderbolt The Republic P-47 Thunderbolt is a World War II-era fighter aircraft produced by the American company Republic Aviation from 1941 through 1945. It was a successful high-altitude fighter and it also served as the foremost American fighter-bombe ...

s from the field until 24 May 1945. The 1st Combat Cargo Group then moved in with C-47s and remained until August when elements of the

4th Combat Cargo Group The 4th Combat Cargo Group was a World War II United States Army Air Forces combat organization that served in Tenth Air Force as part of the China Burma India Theater of World War II. Overview Combat Cargo Groups were to be self-contained group ...

replaced them. The 4th CCG operated supply and passenger flights between the airfield and China until December 1945 when American forces pulled out of the area at the end of the war.

References

* Maurer, Maurer. Air Force Combat Units Of World War II. Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama: Office of Air Force History, 1983.
www.pacificwrecks.com - Myitkyina keyword search

USAFHRA document search Myitkyina

External links

Airports in Myanmar Airfields of the United States Army Air Forces in Myanmar {{Myanmar-airport-stub