IIRC, battle damaged B-29s were landing on Iwo within two weeks and well before the island was secured. No saying when they might have ditched offshore.
Eagle 1
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IIRC, battle damaged B-29s were landing on Iwo within two weeks and well before the island was secured. No saying when they might have ditched offshore.
Eagle 1
I also read of instances of damged B-29s landing on Iwo in the middle of the campaign to take the island so even though tthis photo is undated looks pretty definite that the lugs made it to the Pacific before the war ended.
the first B29 [joltin josie] arrived on saipan october 12th 1944 , she was the first plane in the marianas , by the last week of october there were enough B29s on saipan to make the first combat training mission possible , the first actual mission was against the japanese on truk , the first six were against them on truk and iwo ,
we were bombing iwo nov 5th , 8th , dec 8th & 24th , so iwo wasnt a ditch point till after that ,
there werer three photo missions flown over tokyo by 'tokyo rose' before the first bomb run , she was actualy the first US bomber sinc doolittles strike ,
first tokyo raid was november 24th , my fathers birthday was spent flying 6 hours there and 6 hours back , led by general Odonnell in 'dauntless dotty' with major Morgan[memphis bell] in the copilot seat of his plane ,
the battle for iwo jima began feb 19 1945 ,
march 4th was the day the first B29 landed on iwo , march 10th the first combat mission plane landed she refueled and returned to saipan , 2400 landed there for help , in addition to those that bailed out or ditched , from the 73rd wing off saipan and the 58th wing off tinnian before the end of hostilities , iwo was the halfway mark ,
that photo is from page 154 , of the 20th air force album which covers the 20th bomber comand 5 jun 44 to 2 sep 45 , im looking at my fathers copy as im typing , my signature is that book open to "our babys" nose art with his 73rd wing albumn , my avitar is the tail of "our baby" , A square 10 , on the cover of yank , his plane sitting on hardstand - saipan , dec 7th 1944
so yes , this is near the end of WWII and that carbine is fitted with a bayo lug ,
https://www.milsurps.com/images/impo...ONETS003-1.jpg
Some time ago, I posted a picture of a soldier in a jeep during the plum rains on Okinawa that had a carbine with a bayonet lug. Your picture is only the second photo that I've seen showing a lug during the war. So as far as I'm concerned, two pictures makes a fairly convincing cse.