Warbird Information Exchange

Nicely done! Dan 'my man', wouldn't have expected any less from ya. Good stuff.

Kobayashi's Ki-61 would look great on one of the new ones down the road.

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Zero Surprise!!...

mark, those pics are as good as the japanese "koku fan" brand japanese printed / circulated reference books!!

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tom d. friedman - hey!!! those fokkers were messerschmitts!! * without ammunition, the usaf would be just another flying club!!! * better to have piece of mind than piece of tail!!

All good stuff, Mark (including a few I hadn't seen before).

We'll end the night with this attractive NMF Ki-84 of the 73rd Sentai. The pic was snapped in the Philippines probably in late 1944. By the following March the unit virtually ceased to exist.

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It was a good idea, it just didn't work.

This photo was likely taken post surrender. IIRC, all remaining Japanese aircraft had their propellers removed so that there would be no unauthorized flights.

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Tri-State Warbird Museum Collections Manager & Museum Attendant

Warbird Philosophy Webmaster

Why are the "kill" flags on backwards?

Mudge the curious

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Land of the free because of the brave

I noticed that too. It reminds me of how the American flag is worn backwards on the U.S. military uniform. I've never seen kill flags backwards before though.

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Tri-State Warbird Museum Collections Manager & Museum Attendant

Warbird Philosophy Webmaster

They are not backwards. The staff (canton) side is always to the fore, as if the patch (or decal) were a actually flag being flown by the wearer. Ditto with flags on the tails of aircraft.

As to why they are backwards as kill markers, I'm guessing it's meant as an additional subtle insult.

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Lest Hero-worship raise it's head and cloud our vision, remember that World War II was fought and won by the same sort of twenty-something punks we wouldn't let our daughters date.

Considering those "kills" are just some 1960s Hollywood dressing, I would assume they were simply applied by someone in the art dept. who didn't know squat about flag etiquette or WWII Japanese markings. Wartime Japanese aircrft usually displayed kills as airplane silhouettes or cherry blossoms..I don't think Iv'e ever seen them use flags, outside of the movies or TV. The closest I can think of was a Zero that had some kill marks in the form of white stars on blue circles.

SN

And it was only late in the war that the Japanese started keeping individual tallies. Earlier on, kills were credited to the squadron as a whole to encourage cohesion and commonality of purpose

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Lest Hero-worship raise it's head and cloud our vision, remember that World War II was fought and won by the same sort of twenty-something punks we wouldn't let our daughters date.

i concur!! i've also seen pics of that zero.

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tom d. friedman - hey!!! those fokkers were messerschmitts!! * without ammunition, the usaf would be just another flying club!!! * better to have piece of mind than piece of tail!!