P-38's To The Phillipines By Submarine...?

[RandolphB]

Does anyone know how to find out more about P-38's that were shipped to the Phillipines by submarine during WWII? All have now is stories that it happened, no time frame or details. Does anyone know books or sources I could use to discover more about this story? I'd like to find out when, where and what organizations they went to (US Forces...Phillipino forces?), who was involved, any details on how many aircraft and their history/ numbers.....anything at all!

[Dan Jones]

I think if any P-38's ever went to the Philippines via sub, that they must have been either 1/72 or 1/48 scale!

[JDK]

How would you dismantle a P-38 to get it into a US submarine?

Most subs - even giant subs like the US didn't have - minimise hatch sizes through the pressure hull. For that reason alone, I'm highly sceptical of P-38s being shipped by sub, being a twin boom design, even less able to be broken down (see the extraction of what became 'Glacier Girl' for the smallest 'P-38 through a hole' job).


Normal P-38 breakdown for shipping. Not sub-compatible. Wikimedia.

Of course I may be wrong...

[RandolphB]

My wife's family are Phillipinos, many of which survived the war actually in the Phillipines. What got my interest started was hearing the same basic story from two differing groups of people who didn't know each other....and still haven't met each other. Both groups INSIST that P-38's were delivered via sub as some manner of secret mission or transaction. Sometimes the story is that the aircraft were placed in hiding once they arrived for some unknown purpose. One story I have heard is that the aircraft were heavily disassembled and in some sort of crate. Yes, I know how big a P-38 is, last one I poked around and took pictures of was last Wed. at POF. I believe I've seen all the flying examples except one in the last three years.

It seems well known in the islands that the Japanese buried/ left behind all sorts of stolen properties, and there have been discoveries of buried gold they left behind occasionally reported. That said, there is usually some sort of truth behind stories and myths. Perhaps there were some sort of shipments...of other aircraft? Perhaps its actually P-38s and something nobody has ever brought up outside a few on the islands?

It may be a long shot, but it could uncover an amazing story to try and track this down.

[JDK]

Hi Randolph,
Thanks for the background. It's an interesting tale. However two things count against the P-38 bit; the US not having subs able to transfer or hold a dismantled twin-engine aircraft, and if you did want to put P-38s somewhere, mostly they were able to be flown to the objective, being specifically long range.

How are people classifying it as 'P-38s' - by (possibly mistaken) name, or by identifiable description?

I'm not arguing the size of the P-38, just that it's probably the least suitable US fighter type to do such a job with. Much better to start with, say, a USN type, which would fold easier at least! I'm no expert on US subs, but could you get a radial engine into one? Or an inline? Then what about a P-38 pod?

I agree there's often a grain of truth in stories like this, and we've not got the last revelations from W.W.II, but I'd not venture cash on it being true as told. I agree it's worth having an investigate, though - good luck.

Regards,

[Garth]

Possible source of the story (and confusion)?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-38_can_opener

[John Dupre]

I am not discounting the story, as someone mentioned there are still many aspects of WW2 not fully revealed. Still I think this story is probably a conflation of various stories and events over the years of the war and since. There were efforts to resupply the Phillipines by submarine at Corregidor and Mindanao during the initial invasion and of course throughout the islands to resistance groups afterward. At some point before the surrender there was some talk of keeping an air base supplied (I think in Mindanao) in the Japanese rear. The US did have two quite large submarines (USS Narwhal and Nautilus) nearly as large as a wartime Fletcher class destroyer and twice the displacement of WW1 era destroyers. (I doubt they could have carried a disassembled P-38 though.) Lastly the P-38 was probably the most well known fighter aircraft in the Pacific theater so that when someone in the Phillipines thinks fighters they were likely to think P-38.

[Mudge]

Don't know how many of you have ever been on/in a WWII sub. I have. Let me be as succinct as I can about this....
NO FREAKIN' WAY.
1951. I was 6'6" but only about 180lbs. Getting through those hatches was not an easy task. The sub would have to have been significantly modified to even begin to get pieces of a P-38 inside. Wouldn't have made sense to even try.

Mudge the Navy brat

[B-29 Super Fort]

Unless one was somehow lashed to the deck for a short surface transfer, I doubt it. However, perhaps the stories were based on the shipment of some key P-38 parts.

[Tiger Tim]

Did the USN have any twin-boomed drones at the time?

-Tim

[rreis]

Where german subs bigger than the US ones? because the germans did send airplanes to the japanese using subs... and I think the question now is if it was possible for any fighter to have arrived in the Philipines by submarine...

[Obergrafeter]

It couldn't be the P-38 can opener as they could not be disassembled. Now the German P-38 pistol is a different story. You could have had a bunch of them in a sub.

[RareBear]

I cannot find any indication that the US ever transported aircraft in WW2 via submarine.

The Japanese had 3 classes of sub that did carry aircraft - the B-1's, the AM class, and the I-400 series. They all carried various numbers of small seaplanes for observation duties. The aircraft were all carried in hangars built into the sub's structure, but were not part of the pressure hulls.

I believe the Germans did carry pieces of the ME-262 via submarine to Japan.

Walt

[Nathan]

Perhaps the story is ment that P-38's were strapped on top of the deck of the sub??

[Jarink1]

Lashed to the deck in a watertight, pressure-proof container is pretty much the only way it could have been done. Even with major disassembly, there would not have been any areas inside the sub large enough to store the pieces. The parts would also have to be no larger in diameter than a torpedo (21 inches), which is about as big an object you can get into and out of a sub without a cutting torch.

Japan used some setups like this for delivering supplies to cut off troops via submarine, though I don't think they ever tried transporting aircraft.