Thunder Box: Oboe 7 Portuguese Mitchell GR.IVa

[comrade harps]

North American Mitchell GR.IVa
a/c N, Squadrilia C, Forças Aéreas da Armada (Portuguese Navy Air Forces)
Batchelor, Northern territory, Australia
October, 1945

Despite the 1942 Japanese occupation of East Timor, Portugal officially remained neutral, in part to protect the continuing, but compromised, Portuguese civilian administration that officially collaborated with the occupation forces. However, this relationship was tense, especially as the Portuguese Governor was secretly aiding the Allies with the approval of Lisbon. With the death of the German Fuhrer Adolf Hitler in July, 1944, and the negotiations leading to the Separate Peace/Great Betrayal on the Western Front, the Japanese feared that the Portuguese would finally take a more openly hostile position to Japan's occupation of its Macau and East Timor colonies. This fear precipitated the Japanese to move against the Portuguese civil administration on 13 August, 1944. The Portuguese Governor was placed under house arrest and East Timor was placed under direct Japanese authority from Kupang in the occupied Dutch East Indies, thereby creating a unified Timor that eliminated the pre-war colonial borders. A similar move was undertaken in Macau on the same day.




The Portuguese response was a declaration of war against Japan, announced on 28 August, 1944. Joining the Allies, the Portuguese government set about establishing military forces in Australia to confront the Japanese occupation and lobbying for an Allied plan to liberate East Timor from the enemy. By mid-1945 Portuguese Army and Navy forces were active in Australia and making inroads against Japanese control over East Timor, with Operation Oboe 7 to occupy Dili and Kupang planned for 5 October, 1945.




Squadrilia C, Forças Aéreas da Armada, was established at East Sale, Victoria, Australia, on 2 November, 1944. Designated as a training unit, the personnel of Squadrilia C were mostly experienced Blenheim crews and were undergoing English language, technical, tactical and procedural training before moving to Bairnsdale where they flew RAAF Beauforts. In March, 1945, the unit moved to Pearce in Western Australia where they met their future combat mounts, 25 North American Mitchell IVs.



The Mitchell IV was a Lend-Lease version of the B-25J. Originally to be completed as PBJ-1J airframes for the USMC, 50 airframes were release for export when the US Navy brokered a deal to acquire Douglas A-26 Invaders for USMC use as the PBD-1 Invader. Not required by the USAF, the 50 airframes were given to Australia under Lend-Lease terms, who issued them to the RAAF's No. 18 (Netherlands East Indies) Squadron and Portugal's Squadrilia C (with the RAAF themselves taking on the PBD-1 via US Navy contracts[/url]).



Although nominally PBJ-1Js and painted in US Navy all-over Dark Sea Blue camouflage, the Mitchell IVs were delivered to the the RAAF as a "green" airframes without the PBJ-1J's radar and all had the greenhouse nose of the standard B-25J level bomber (but without the Norden bombsight, which had to be added in Australia). To produce the baseline operational Mitchell GR.IV, RAAF technicians adapted the planes to carry the British AI Mk X radar in a wing pod, removed the dorsal gun turret and replaced it with a rotatable astrodome featuring a flat window pane for navigational observations. The waist gun mounts were faired over and the side fuselage guns removed. These measured reflected the lack of enemy aerial opposition, but also the need to save weight and reduce drag for greater range and endurance. 325 US gallon fuel tanks were fitted to the bomb bays as standard, leaving the underwing racks to carry bombs, mines and rockets.  Two variations of the Mitchell IV were also produced. The Mitchell PR.IV was modified for the photo-recce role with mission equipment similar to the F-10 version of the B-25 and the Mitchell GR.IVa (modelled here) was a strafer with 20mm Hispano cannon mounted in a modified greenhouse nose.




Squadrilia C began combat missions with a mix of GR.IV, PR.IV and GR.IVa Mitchells from Batchelor in November, 1944. Operating as part of the RAAF's North-Western Area Command (NWAC), the squadron flew a wide range of missions that were codenamed with NWAC's characteristic nomenclature based on Aussie cultural references, slang and ocker phrases. These included defensive shipping lane patrols (Top Paddock), convoy escorts (Deadset), photographic reconnaissance (Ginger Meggs), formation level bombing (Pub Brawl), single-plane night heckler attack (Meat Tray), offensive maritime reconnaissance patrols (Chook Raffle) and mine laying (Ugg Boot). Starting in August, 1945, and in preparation for Oboe 7, Squadrilia C began flying Woop Woop missions over Timor; these involved 2 planes (usually a GR.IV and a GR.IVa) performing visual reconnaissance over Timor while in contact with Allied naval vessels and Allied troops on the ground and making on-call attacks and coordinating actions with aerial, ground and naval assets. In October these were supplemented by similar nocturnal missions codenamed Thunder Box. The original caption for the photo of Mitchell GR.IVa coded N on which this model is based states that it was "ready for another night Thunder Box mission." The underwing ordnance is six 5 inch rockets and two 65 US Gallon napalm tanks.

[Old Wombat]

Nice one, comrade!

[rickshaw]

You do realise, I hope that in real life it was Australia which invaded Portuguese East Timor first, before the Japanese?   Something that not even most Australians know or understand.   Of course it was done with the agreement (post ipso facto) of the Portuguese Government in Lisbon, to "prevent East Timor falling into Japanese hands."   

[comrade harps]

You do realise, I hope that in real life it was Australia which invaded Portuguese East Timor first, before the Japanese?   Something that not even most Australians know or understand.   Of course it was done with the agreement (post ipso facto) of the Portuguese Government in Lisbon, to "prevent East Timor falling into Japanese hands."   

Yes, I am aware of that. In fact,  it was the Aussies and the Dutch together.

[PR19_Kit]

That's a mean looking beast, and nicely done as well. 

[Sport21ing]

https://giphy.com/gifs/luffy-UlexC9HXTiNz2

It's beautifull 

[comrade harps]

This build was inspired by late war USMC PBJ-1s, which in contrast to the trend of adding more guns to their Mitchells actually had most of the .50s removed. Range and endurance were more important than firepower.

The gunship nose conversion was inspired by similar field mods (but Anglisizeand with 20mm Hispanos) and the anticipated need to add a poop load of lead to the nose.

[zenrat]

 

[DogfighterZen]

Love it! Very nice looking beast, Comrade! And a very good backstory!
That's very close to what i have in mind for Portuguese involvement in the Pacific TO but i'll be concentrating on fighters.

[Captain Canada]

Great job on this one. Sexy, sinister....well armed. perfect ! I really like what you`ve done.