uss mt hood

[sobo]

A little late on this, but I thought you all might enjoy this shot of my Dad next to his Jug, a couple of months before he was shot down the the first day of the Battle of the Bulge, while his flight was trying to stop tanks from taking St. Vith.

McCB,

My Uncle Frank thanks your late father for his protection during that first day of the battle. I know it sounds corny now, but apparently fighter jocks/air support pilots really were referred to as "angels on our shoulders", just like Tom Hanks says in Shaving Ryan's Privates.

[ivan]

A little late on this, but I thought you all might enjoy this shot of my Dad next to his Jug, a couple of months before he was shot down the the first day of the Battle of the Bulge, while his flight was trying to stop tanks from taking St. Vith.

McCB,

My Uncle Frank thanks your late father for his protection during that first day of the battle. I know it sounds corny now, but apparently fighter jocks/air support pilots really were referred to as "angels on our shoulders", just like Tom Hanks says in Shaving Ryan's Privates.

funny b/c, in the beginning in n africa, american soldiers were famous for shooting up their own air support, to the point where fighters basically stopped goign near them

[sobo]

A little late on this, but I thought you all might enjoy this shot of my Dad next to his Jug, a couple of months before he was shot down the the first day of the Battle of the Bulge, while his flight was trying to stop tanks from taking St. Vith.

McCB,

My Uncle Frank thanks your late father for his protection during that first day of the battle. I know it sounds corny now, but apparently fighter jocks/air support pilots really were referred to as "angels on our shoulders", just like Tom Hanks says in Shaving Ryan's Privates.

funny b/c, in the beginning in n africa, american soldiers were famous for shooting up their own air support, to the point where fighters basically stopped goign near them

Just going on what my uncle said, ivan. YMMV...

[ivan]

A little late on this, but I thought you all might enjoy this shot of my Dad next to his Jug, a couple of months before he was shot down the the first day of the Battle of the Bulge, while his flight was trying to stop tanks from taking St. Vith.

McCB,

My Uncle Frank thanks your late father for his protection during that first day of the battle. I know it sounds corny now, but apparently fighter jocks/air support pilots really were referred to as "angels on our shoulders", just like Tom Hanks says in Shaving Ryan's Privates.

funny b/c, in the beginning in n africa, american soldiers were famous for shooting up their own air support, to the point where fighters basically stopped goign near them

Just going on what my uncle said, ivan. YMMV...

no, no, i wasn't disagreeing - he'd be right as rain for d-day and after - by then the krauts had virtually no air force, so there was no american fear of being strafed - in n africa in '42 however, the nazis pretty much owned the sky, so gi's figured everything w/ wings was out to get them, much to the dismay of the few american pilots who were trying to do their job

[sobo]

Oh, OK, gotcha!

[ScottP]

Best 3 WWII flicks:

 

Das Boot

Patton

Thin Red Line

 

Come and See (1985)

 

Enemy At The Gates

 

that's a joke, right tool?

 

Fast forward through all the love triangle bullshit (as I did), and you've got a pretty compelling war story, based on an actual 'duel' between a Russian and a German sniper during the Battle of Stalingrad.

See Enemy at the Gates: The Battle for Stalingrad by William Craig, tool.

[Hugh Conway]

Fast forward through all the love triangle bullshit (as I did), and you've got a pretty compelling war story, based on an actual 'duel' between a Russian and a German sniper during the Battle of Stalingrad.

See Enemy at the Gates: The Battle for Stalingrad by William Craig, tool.

 

Fast forward through all but the battle scene and 'Pearl Harbor' is pretty cool too

[sobo]

Thought I'd dredge up this thread from last year, since I haven't seen anything here today about the topic and I didn't feel like starting another one when we already had one.

 

My personal thanks to all veterans - serving, retired, or laid to rest.

[Dechristo]

hear, hear!

[ivan]

nice - dang budget cuts nixed the fall semester of my history of war class so i'm not following my anniversaries so much these days

 

again, wtf? doesn't it seem like awful bad luck to name yer ship the uss mt hood?

[Pete_H]

Better name than the USS Mt. St. Helens.

 

 

For WWII cinema, The Pacific series and the two memoirs on which its based (Helmet for my Pillow by Rob Leckie and With the Old Breed by Eugene Sledge) are quite excellent.

 

For the commute, currently listening to Matterhorn (on audiobook), the Vietnam War novel by Seattle author Karl Malantes. I'd recommend that also.

 

Sobo, that pic of your uncle carrying a potato masher is pretty badass!

[Dechristo]

My maternal grandfather served in both The Great War and WWII - his HAM radio moniker was "Retread" in reference. Both his sons served also, in WWII: Tony in the Pacific theater, and Bud in Europe, a tail gunner on a B-17 - one of the lucky few with that job to make it home. They all made it home.

[tvashtarkatena]

Private Asstacular Fucktard, reporting for duty!

[prole]

Edited November 14, 2011 by prole

[tvashtarkatena]

Celebrated this year with an all Nazi all the time double feature: Downfall and The Goebbels Experiment.

[tvashtarkatena]

Also celebrated by watching the Symbol of Our Great Nation flare into a tight spiral drop, talons, well, spread eagle, to beat a murder of really pissed off ravens to a big ole hunk of stinky beach carrion.

 

If there's a metaphor to be had in there somewhere...dog(fish)pile!

 

 

[ivan]

my favorite bit of his from the film:

"Well, yeah, man, you see, like, all the tanks we come up against are bigger and better than ours, so all we can hope to do is, like, scare 'em away, y'know. This gun is an ordinary 76mm but we add this piece of pipe onto it, and the Krauts think, like, maybe it's a 90mm. We got our own ammunition, it's filled with paint. When we fire it, it makes... pretty pictures. Scares the hell outta people! We have a loudspeaker here, and when we go into battle we play music, very loud. It kind of... calms us down."

[sobo]

" Always with the negative waves, Moriarty. Always with the negative waves..."

[sobo]

Sobo, that pic of your uncle carrying a potato masher is pretty badass!

Thanks! This past May I went back east and met my Uncle Frank for the very first time. He doesn't like to talk much about the killing part of his service in the 101. But if you get him lubed up a bit, he can tell some pretty funny tales about the fun they had during and after the war. The things they did with Hitler's stuff at the Eagle's Nest was fucking hilarious. After they found and "destroyed" Goering's wine cellar, they decided to test the bulletproof glass in the windows of Hitler's staff car with their Thompson 45 submachine guns. According to Frank, "...it wasn't entirely bulletproof, but it took a lot of ammo to prove it." Then they took his transport plane for a joyride, having figured out how to take off. It wasn't until they got it airborne that they realized no one on board knew how to land it. The boys fucked it up pretty good, but they all managed to live. The pic below was almost the last one of Uncle Frank alive...

 

Frank had a bunch more, but my brother and I were busting a gut so hard that we told him he had to stop talking.