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To war in the China-Burma-India theatre with the American Volunteer Group! There can be few more famous flying units in the Second World War than the group of volunteer fighter pilots recruited in 1941 by retired US Army Captain Claire L. Chennault to help China turn the tables in the beleagured country's air war against the Japanese. Flying Curtiss P-40B Tomahawks diverted from planned deliveries to the RAF, the three squadrons of the American Volunteer Group (AVG) soon found themselves pitched alongside RAF and Dutch comrades into a desperate, losing battle against the post-Pearl Harbour Japanese flood tide, notably in Burma. The AVG and RAF initially mounted a spirited air defence of the capital Rangoon. But as enemy ground forces swept towards them, capturing airfields closer and closer to the city, their task became increasingly hopeless and in the end, abortive. Nicknamed 'Flying Tigers' from the insignia devised from them by Disney, the unit was of course famous for a different marking - the gaudy 'Sharkmouth' on the noses of their P-40s, inspired it is said by a similar marking seen on a photo of a 112 Squadron RAF Tomahawk, itself supposedly inspired in turn by the 'Haifisch' marking carried by Bf 110 heavy fighters of ZG 76. Fame came early to the Flying Tigers, not least thanks to the 1942 film starring John Wayne, no less, that many of us will remember from later screenings on TV. The characterisations appear but crude stereotypes today, but at the time, the desperate and destructive war in the Far East was at its height. Thanks to Chennault's experience in theatre, the Flying Tigers were early pioneers of the sort of 'hit and run', 'boom and zoom' tactics that soon became widely adopted, for combating the more nimble but less powerful Japanese fighters. The AVG fought shoulder to shoulder with British and Commonwealth comrades in Burma and after the latter's fall, to defend China's vital lifeline of supplies flown over the 'hump' from India. But those battles and others against Japanese offensives in China, were fought mainly by the AVG's USAAF successors, who inherited the nickname and the fighting reputation of the original group, which was disbanded in July 1942. The campaign There have been several AVG campaigns for IL-2 over the years but the one I'm flying here is SAS_Monty's, which was designed for the modified 4.12 version of the sim, which is what I'm mostly flying at the moment, since the arrival of the Combined User Patch (CUP) mod. You can find the download link, a campaign video and some more info, here. Another attraction for me is that the campaign features the defence of Burma, which I had read about in the detailed and generally excellent first volume of Grub Street's aptly-named South-East Asia air war history, 'Bloody Shambles'. Fans of Kipling will relish the opportunity to fight (altogether now) 'On the road to Mandalay/Where the flying fishes play/And the sun comes up like thunder/Out'a China, cross the bay'. It ain't half hot, mum! But enough of references to now politically-incorrect writer-poets and BBC TV comedies about the vital role of Concert Parties in the war in the Far East. If you are expecting to be pitched straight into desperate dogfights against Nates, Oscars and Sallys - to use the Allied reporting names for the Imperial Japanese Army's Ki-27 and Ki-43 fighters and Ki-21 bombers - well, steady there, (flying) tiger. Battleship Row at Pearl still lies undisturbed and the war in the Pacific, unstarted. Your first job - after watching the neat black & white opening video 'track' which accompanies a narrative intro to the AVG - is a ferry flight in a C-47, from Rangoon up to the AVG's real-life training base further north, at Toungoo. This starts well enough, with time to admire the plentiful scenery at busy Mingaladon airfield, just north of capital Rangoon. Like the P-40s you'll be flying later, the two C-47s on this flight - we should probably call them DC-3s, in keeping with the secrecy necessarily surrounding this surrogate US intervention - may be ex-USAAF; but for now, they're the property of the Government of nationalist Chiang Kai Shek's Republic of China. And marked accordingly. The USA isn't in this war, officially...not just yet, anyway. I'm not a big fan of civvy flight sims but I must admit I got a certain amount of fun out of flying my Dakota, as the C-47 is generally better known in the UK. It took a lot of key tapping - no fancy HOTAS setups here - but in the end I was able to trim her nicely to climb 'hands off', although what I expect was a bit of a crosswind, or maybe a bit of aileron trim she needed, made occasional corrections necessary to keep wings level. The flight up north in a heavily-laden transport was actually like one of those civilian flying challenges in FSX. The tricky bit was...well, not my pet hate, formation flying, since you don't especialy have to fly in close company with the other aircraft on this trip, though he will tell you off on the radio if you become too independent. It's first, (slowly) climbing through the clouds - a good idea, to avoid colliding with the Pegu Yomas which rise across your fligth path. You get radio becaon fixes displayed every so often but if like me, you generally 'cheat' by leaving switched on the minimap path and your aircraft's icon, such things aren't really needed. Having got above the darkening clouds, all was well, for a while. I tried to listen in to radio stations duing the flight, as the mission brief recommends, but though I tuned into both BBC World Service and Radio Honolulu, reception seemed basically non-exstent. So much for listening to Vera Lynn's latest number, to while away the dull bit of the flight. The next fun comes when it's time to descend through the cloudbase. At first all looked well, with the tree-covered foothills falling away beneath usand paddy fields appearing ahead. There's a great new Burma map included with CUP and I'm assuming this is it. The cloud ceiling was quite low and when I got to that level, the weather was suddenly awful, with visibility to match and lightning flashing, in and below the clouds, as the rain lashed down all the while. Then, in the deteriorating weather, there's the challenge of finding my destination. Finally, I actually had to land there, which was going to be tricky enough in the pouring rain, not least because the layout of Toungoo airfield was unknown to me and was going to be invisible in the murk, until i was pretty well on top of it. in the circumstances, I decided to let the autopilot handle the last leg and I'm glad that I did, because two interesting things happened, that I might otherwise have missed. First, during a spell of slightly clearer weather, we suddenly did a supply drop, which I hadnt been expecting. Next, I had a great view of Toungoo itself, the town not the airfield. At first, I thought this was Fort Dufferin, famous for a 14th Army battle to evict the Japanese in 1945. But that's in a different part of Burma. It was quite a sight, nevertheless, worth seeing, if not worth going to see, as the famous diarist Dr Johnston once said of the Giant's Causeway (sorry, to anyone from the Burmese or Northern Ireland tourist boards, who might happen to be reading this). Happily, the AI co-pilot to whom I had turned over our aeroplane seemed to know the area well enough, for despite the murk he made a faultless, if somewhat unorthodox, partial, circuit, followed by a fine landing which I would have struggled to match, at the best of times. His ground handling was pretty good, too, and we were soon stopped next to the other C-47/DC-3/Dakota. Now, perhaps, we could get down to business! But, as in real life, Claire Chennault had other plans for his newly-arrived tiger cubs. ...to be continued!

First mission in a brand new campaign! Apart from the occasional mission, I have never seriously tried flying bombers in Il-2. I'm quite fond of shooting them down...or trying to, at any rate. I have flown bombers in CFS3 using that sim's simplified bombing system and in B-17 II The Mighty Eighth, with its much superior facilities, including a decent simulation of the Norden bombsight. However, having of late much enjoyed flying with Il-2's new Community User Patch (CUP), I decided it was time to get serious with bombing in this sim. The deciding factor was the recent arrival of a brand-new bomber campaign, made specifically for CUP and featuring one of my favourite aircraft, the mighty Avro Lancaster. I had enjoyed flying this big bird in Just Flight's excellent CFS2 'Dambusters' add-on and wasn't going to miss the chance to try her out in an Il-2 campaign...even if it meant sitting for long periods in a darkened room! The campaign is by Hamm66 and you can get it over at Mission4Today, here: http://www.mission4today.com/index.php?name=Downloads3&file=details&id=2137 '1942 Lancaster Tour of Duty' features ten semi-historical missions from the wartime career of 44 (Rhodesia) Squadron, RAF Bomber Command, apparently the first unit to re-equip with the Lancaster. We are based at RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire, a county where so many bomber squadrons were based for what became the great Allied bomber offensive against Nazi Germany. Here's the briefing for the first mission...an unusual one, to be sure. It's Christmas 1941 and - as in real life - the squadron is about to get its first Lancs. My 'mission' is to trundle down to the runway in a jeep and watch our brand new aircraft arrive, presumably flown in by RAF Ferry Command, recently formed to fly new planes to operational airfields. Just like ours. So I loaded up the mission and there I was, sitting in my jeep, alone. The weather was rather murky and it seemed the others had decided that their first close-up look at the new planes could wait. Fair enough! This was my first time driving a ground vehicle of any type, in Il-2. The silence suggested that starting my engine might be a good way to get going, so that's what I did. The joystick seemed to control things much as with an aircraft and I was soon on my way. But which way? I followed the track I was on, which led to a long, wide paved area which was obviously a runway. Here I stopped. I was reminded of the story told me by my late dad, who was a mechanic in the RAF, post-war, and served all over the world, much of the time, of all things, in an Air Sea Rescue launch. On this occasion he was based closer to home and on terra firma, at RAF Ballykelly in Northern Ireland. He was on a tea break, the problem being that the tea was being served from a NAAFI van which was over on the opposite side of the runway. He had a bike at his disposal and while it was of course strictly forbidden, there was nobody about and so he cycled straight across to the NAFFI van. As he was sipping his tea there, a Lanc came in and landed. But instead of taxying off to dispersal, the bomber came to a halt next to the NAFFI van. Out came the navigator, and ran across to the van. Who was the airman, he demanded to know, who had cycled across the runway a few minutes ago, causing the Lanc to have to break off its approach and go around? He had been despatched by the pilot to get that man's name. The presence of the bicycle next to my dad made denials rather fruitless! This was a mistake I wasn't going to make now! So I pulled up short of the runway, and I waited... ...and I waited. No sign of the Lancs. Was I at the right runway? Hard to say, but I decided to sit tight where I was. No point in incurring the wrath of the ferry pilots or worse, the Rock Apes (as Air Force people call the RAF Police, after those famously cheeky primates who inhabit the Rock of Gibraltar). Had the flight been cancelled, perhaps? It was Christmas, after all. But no, the party was still on. Undeterred by the rather poor visibility, the Lancasters were coming! And a fine sight they made, too, even though they were still carrying the squadron codes of an Operational Conversion Unit. Soon, hopefully, they would carry instead the 'KM' of our very own 'Forty-four'. Finally, I saw them, slipping into and out of the murk that lay all around, as they joined the circuit. By this time, they had shaken out into line astern and the landings could not now be long away. Soon, the leader was breaking off and then settling down into his approach. Of all this, I saw nothing. I WAS at the wrong runway, although I could hear the R/T chatter, which somebody was evidently blasting out on a loudspeaker for all and sundry to hear. Except that all and sundry were likely watching from the comfort of their respective messes, leaving me sitting out here in the cold. At the wrong runway. Enough! I daren't cross the apparently-inactive runway ahead even so but I'd sat there long enough. Off I went, seeming to startle a flock of geese, which took to the skies as I roared past...hopefully not heading in the direction of those other, much bigger birds now in the vicinity. Recklessly endangering Government property - to wit, four Avro Lancaster aircraft - by driving geese into the skies while they were landing, would make for an interesting Charge Sheet, but this was the RAF and anything was possible, in the pursuit those guilty of any form of of '..conduct to the prejudice of good order and military discipline'. I never did get to see the Lancasters land. Taking a turn too tightly brought my trip around the airfield to a sudden end. All I could hope for was everybody else was watching the bombers land, rather than my four-wheel drive aerobatics. Happily, the Lancs didn't put a wheel wrong, landing one after another, past a row of rather obsolete-looking Whitleys. Once down, each machine taxied out to a dispersal point. Soon all were down. The first of our new warplanes had arrived. From here on in, it was over to us! ...to be continued!