“We're going to need a lot of help.”
Flight Line, Laum Mwuak Airfield, Thai/Japanese Indochina Border
The violence of the attack was unexpected. What seemed like a whole battalion of Japanese troops had swarmed out of the treeline and charged across the cleared area. They'd come under a crossfire from the machine guns in the Guardhouse and the Cookhouse but that hadn't stopped them.. They'd left bodies behind on the grass, that was certain, but not enough. They'd blown the wire and only a barrage of point-blank fire from the machine pistols of the troops in the residential area had finally stopped them.
Then, the Japanese had opened up on the flight line with the small mortars they carried. Two of the Hawk Ills were already burning, their fabric skins had already gone and their structure was outlined in the pre-dawn darkness as a glowing blueprint of fire.
Down the line, Pilot Officer Maen Prasongdi was first to get his aircraft moving, swerving out of the parking lot and down the runway. His move caught the Japanese by surprise, they hadn't expected the pilots to be waiting in their aircraft and their fire went wild. Maen got off the runway, clawed for altitude then swung his aircraft around for a strafing pass. His twin .30s started hammering as his nose lined up with the Japanese troops pinned by the crossfire outside the residential area. They were firing back and he felt the thuds as bullets tore into the fabric of his aircraft. Then, his Hawk lurched as the four 60 kilogram bombs dropped free and he was clear, trailing smoke but out and heading for Phnom Penh and the Ostrichs
Flight Sergeant Phrom Shuwong never got that far. Following Maen down the runway, he caught all the fire aimed at his aircraft plus most of the bullets aimed at his leader. His Hawk III was badly damaged before it even left the runway and as he climbed out, those on the ground saw his body jerking in the cockpit. Airborne for less than a few seconds, his Hawk III stalled out and spun into the ground.
Behind him, Sergeant Jamnien Wariyakun never even got off the ground. Raked by bullets, his tires blew as he made his run. The Hawk III swerved off the runway, then its wingtip caught the grass and it ground-looped, disintegrating as it spun across the grass and exploded. To the amazement of everybody, Jamnien actually managed to jump clear as the aircraft flew apart and tried to run for cover. He made about ten steps before Japanese fire cut him down.
Perhaps the spectacle distracted the Japanese because Flight Sergeant Sanit Rohityothin actually made it into the air. Like his leader, he swung around, trying to strafe the approaching Japanese. He was too low, and too slow. The groundfire got him as he started his run and his Hawk was burning before it started its dive into the ground.
Flight Sergeant Kab Khamsin was still trying to start his engine when he and the plane next to his were rushed by Japanese troops. They'd used a drainage ditch for cover and had got through the first defense line to get loose into the fighter park. Their bullets raked both aircraft, killing Kab in his cockpit and severely wounding Flight Sergeant Phorn Chalermsuk.
The Japanese might have been better advised to take a closer look at the aircraft on the flight line, or perhaps brush up on their aircraft recognition because they missed an important fact. The aircraft they passed on their way to attack the two Hawks wasn't a tighter at all. The old biplane was a Corsair ground attack aircraft, manned by Flying Officer Suatl Sukhserm, with Airman Somphong Naeibanlhad as his rear gunner. The Japanese rushing past were a target Somphong couldn't resist. His twin .30 machineguns raked the group, mowing them down as the Corsair turned out of the flightline onto the runway. Somphong kept firing, his machine guns stitching the area where the Japanese were firing on the escaping aircraft. He pinned them down just long enough for the Corsair to get off the ground. Over the racket of the engine and the hammering of his machine guns he could have sworn he could hear the cheers from the airmen fighting in the residential area and around the guardhouse. Behind them, the tighter parking area was a sea of black smoke and burning aircraft.
Headquarters Section, Japanese 2nd Battalion, 143 Division
The black smoke was clearly visible over the roofs of the residential area buildings, lit by the sun edging over the eastern horizon. That residential area was quickly turning into a death-trap for the advancing Japanese. The Thai airmen with their machine pistols were in their element, fighting room to room. They knew the ground, it was, quite literally their homes, and they were making the Japanese pay for every meter. Automatic fire was the key; even the new semiautomatic Arisakas couldn't match the fire from those machine pistols at close range.
Major Kisoyoshi Utsunomiya had already worked out what to do about it. The residential area was a hornet's nest but it was untenable if he could get his people around its flanks. The thing that stood in his way were the two strong points off to his left, what was obviously a guard house and another building beyond that. Both hadn't been fully engaged yet and the streams of machine gun fire from them were pinning down his flank. Take those two strongpoints out and he'd have a clear path through the hangars, cutting the whole residential area off. Time to take down the strongpoints.
“Follow me!” He leapt up swinging his sword, his flag-carrier unfurling the great Rising Sun beside him. As his men got up to advance on the Guardhouse, he heard the sound of an aircraft engine. That's when he realized his mistake. The first pilots to try and take off had been fighter pilots, full of courage and urge to fight but untrained in the ways of ground attack. They'd turned too early and been shot down. The Corsair crew were ground attack specialists, they were wily, they'd got clear, built up speed and come in when they judged the moment right.
Now the Corsair was sweeping over his men, its forward .50 caliber machineguns spewing tracer into their ranks, the tail gunner spraying the infantry as they passed. Beneath them, a line of explosions marked the 60 kilogram bombs dropping clear, Utsunomiya cursed, the attack was perfectly timed, it had broken the momentum of his move and revealed his plan. The guardhouse would be expecting to become the center of attention.
Then, as the Corsair swept overhead, Utsunomiya saw something he thought was long past. For perhaps the last time in modern warfare, a old biplane with an open cockpit was flying over a battlefield with its pilot's white silk scarf streaming in the wind behind him. As the Corsair vanished behind the treeline on its way to Phnom Penh, Utsunomiya carefully and very precisely saluted its crew.
Phnom Penh South Airfield, Recovered Provinces, Thai/and
The flight line was boiling with activity. Each of the twelve Ostriches lined up by the main runway had a group of men feeding their charge with the supplies it needed to fight. One group was feeding belts of .50 Browning ammunition into the tanks supplying the wing guns, another was beside the fuselage, lifting up belts of the big 23mm V-YA cannon rounds into the armored bathtub that protected the aircraft's crew. Other groups were hanging rockets on the rails under the wings or fitting bombs to the fuselage and inner-wing hardpoints. Yet more men were by the fuel bowsers, feeding aviation gasoline into the aircraft's self-sealing tanks.
For all the activity, the sound of an aircraft engine brought a standstill. The base was so used to the hearty roar of twin Pratt and Whitney R-2800s that the little Wright R-I820 sounded puny. Then, the aircraft itself came over the treeline, instantly recognized as a Hawk III. That meant it had to be from Laum Mwuak, the wing there was the only one still operating the old Curtiss biplane. The trail of black smoke and the unsteadiness of its flight were eloquent of an aircraft and pilot in serious trouble. Underneath the staggering fighter, the sound of its engine was drowned out by the sirens of a rescue truck and an ambulance racing out to be on hand when it landed.