TRIPLE-ACE PILOT“ BUD” ANDERSON WITH HIS TRUSTY PARTNER, THE P-51“ OLD CROW.”
to conducting our large formation flights in daylight bombing raids and we suffered tremendous losses. Still, we were Americans, and we were determined to continue our mission as long as we were needed to help win the war. By the middle of 1943, the strategic bombing of Germany was very much in doubt. We targeted several German ball bearing factories, where we lost as much as sixty to eighty planes. To put that number in perspective, that’ s ten men per crew, so 600 or 800 men.
Fortunately, another big break for Bud Anderson came when my group joined the 8th Air Force Command as an escort unit for our bombers. They wanted us to surround the bombers, and when the enemy came in we were supposed to drive them away and then return to close escort. You could chase enemy aircraft to 18,000 feet then you had to break off the attack and return to the bombers. The Luftwaffe had to be defeated before we could invade Europe. It was mandatory. We had to establish air superiority and make it impossible for the Luftwaffe to stop the invasion. So we had a change in command when General Doolittle was put in charge of the 8th Air Force. This occurred about the same time as when the Mustangs arrived. I think those two
12 AMERICAN VALOR QUARTERLY