Belly Flop, The U.S.
Navy’s World War II Glider Misstep
Gliders appeared
the only practical means for aircraft to complement Marine seaborne
assaults via landing craft and amphibious vehicles. It would require
gliders to be towed aloft from the sea or hard surface fields, and then
glide free to a landing in the water. This was a bold innovation,
envisioning swarms of gliders towed into range of the objective, setting
down in the shallows, and beaching to deposit squads of Marines ashore
instead of the long and vulnerable motoring to the beach of landing craft
from ships offshore. It appears that inland landings were considered
impractical.
Commandant of the Marine Corps, Maj. Gen. Thomas
Holcomb, decided in October 1940 to train one Marine battalion of each
regiment as ‘air troops.’ One company would be paratroopers while the
rest would be lifted in by aircraft to ‘airland’ into the combat zone.
With Knox’s subsequent direction, the Navy began exploring the potential
of gliders as one means of lifting the Marine air troops. While the entire
notion of United States Marine Corps amphibious gliders was not carefully
studied before program initiation, and caused many a furrowed brow, it was
certainly worth exploring considering the new tactics and shattering
victories of Germany and Japan.
The Navy was to develop and procure the gliders
while the Corps trained their own pilots and airborne troops. The
Commandant wrote the Chief of the Bureau of Aeronautics (BuAer) on May 31,
1941, stating the USMC’s desires. The assistant chief, Capt. Marc A.
Mitscher, had already initiated glider development when the effort was
announced in April - although he made no secret of his skepticism. One of
his officers, Comdr. Delmar S. Fahrney, had previously begun a bomb
glider, or ‘Glomb,’ program as an adjunct to a long-standing unmanned
drone effort, and this would run coincident with the Marine transport
glider work. On April 30, Fahrney directed the Naval Air Factory (NAF), in
Philadelphia, to perform a transport glider design study. Fahrney and the
BuAer team would continue managing contracts and guiding the overall
program.
The NAF assigned Lt. Comdr. (soon Comdr., then
Capt.) Ralph S. Barnaby to supervise the design project. Among his team,
participating in the eventual flight testing, were Marine pilots Maj.
Richard E. Figley, Lt. (later Capt.) Robert V. Reilly, . . . .
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WWII USMC glider training at Parris Island, S.C.
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