The Forgotten 500

The story many of you didn't know. A story of 500 American soldiers rescued by Yugoslavian Serbs.



Gregory A. Freeman

The Forgotten 500 - Serbs Rescued 500 American Pilots in World War II

 

The forgotten 500 was an incredible book, start to finish, we had the privileged last year of having a chat discussion with the author Gregory Freeman on the forums, here is a link to the transcript if you care to read,we asked him questions about the subject and he was kind enough to give us more insight on the subject.

http://www.ww2f.com/wwii-books-publ...gues-chat-gregory-freeman-june-28-2009-a.html

 

A superb book. The chat last year was great, If only we had more intrest for the others David had lined up for us.

A stroy so good, if Hollywood made it up it wouldn't be believed.

 

Unrelated to the topic, I see the OP was Dishonourably Discharged. I don't want this to happen to me, so I'm wondering if this thread violated some code of posting of which I am not aware.

 

The role of Gen Mihailovic is being re examined-especially in light of revelations of a communist campaign of disinformation against Mihailovic and the Cetnik movement from within Western Intelligence. It is starting to appear that the "collaboration" charges are rather flimsy (you could charge TITO with the same thing in that confusing, four way conflict). If you read the book it also becomes apparent that SOMEBODY was trying to sabotage the 500 mission from the very start (as in dropping the team over a firefight!!???)
YouTube - SPREMTE SE SPREMTE CETNICI NIKOLA UROSEVIC GEDZA
JeffinMNUSA

PS. A thread on the subject; http://www.ww2f.com/eastern-europe-october-1939-february-1943/33555-chetnik-movement-serbia.html
And another; http://www.google.com/custom?q=cetn...;S:http://forum.axishistory.com;FORID:1&hl=en

 

Yes Jeff - the books goes into pretty good detail about that. A very famous Communist Spy in British Intelligence was feeding misinformation - making the Communists Partisans out to be the good guys, while Mihalovic's Partisans to be 'bad/brutal'. It was basically a Civil War. The Brits didn't want the American Agents dropping into Yugoslavia to organize the evacuation since it would be counter-what they had been telling people about Mihalovics Partisans.

 

Several crews from the Old Gunner’s bomb group were part of the story of the “Forgotten 500”, so I began reading this book with great interest. The introduction and first chapter or so had me hooked. Then the author began describing operations and setting up how some of the crewmen landed among the Chetniks, and I’m suddenly jarred by a string of glaring errors in quick succession.

First, the author declares the HALPRO mission to Ploesti a “success” and that the “bombing run caused substantial damage”, when in fact the attackers were forced to bomb through an undercast by dead reckoning and it is debatable whether they were actually over Ploesti much less over the Astra Romano refinery that was the intended target. Then he repeats the myth that the TIDAL WAVE “route navigator” and “backup route navigator” were aboard Flavelle and Iovine’s aircraft leaving the formation with “no expert navigators”. He also gets it completely wrong concerning the separation that occurred between the 376[SUP]th[/SUP] and 93[SUP]rd[/SUP] BGs and the other three.

Next is the story of a B-24 ball gunner trapped in the turret without power as the plane was descending after the all the remaining crew had bailed out. According to the author, “There was no way to exit the turret without raising it into the fuselage of the plane, so a turret that could not be retracted was a deathtrap for the gunner”. In reality, the turret is lowered prior to entry and retracted after exit. The turret is rotated guns-down to access the entry hatch once it is lowered into position. According to the story, the BT gunner spends 10 minutes manually retracting himself with a hand crank inside the turret, except the retraction mechanism is a hydraulic cylinder powered by a hand pump mounted inside the fuselage. After extracting himself from the turret, the gunner bailed out a non-existent “side door”. This particular gunner is credited with participating in the invasion of Southern France even though he was shot down on 28 July. In the process the author declares the B-17 ball turret “manually retractable” which it was not retractable at all.

“Thirty-six B-24 bombers from bases all over Italy formed up for this mission to Ploesti”. Maybe 36 bombers from the 465[SUP]th[/SUP] BG formed up (the group the BTG belonged to), but from “bases all over Italy”, it is off by almost a factor of 10 – 347 bombers dropped on Ploesti that day.

I’m hoping that the author’s research on HALYARD is better than what’s been shown so far.

 

According to David Owen's memoirs, the reason why Mihailovik chetnik movement and Mihailovik himself lost the support of the West, was because Sir Winston Churchill was looking for a common front against the Germans not between the Chetniks and the Partizans.Also it is noteworthy to mention is that Churchill was looking with a distrust and didn't believe neither Mihailovik nor Tito.In some parts certain cethnik vojvoda were fighting alongside the Germans,especially in Macedonia it is noteworthy to give the name Chetnik vojvoda Kosta Pecanec whose movement was neutralized in the February offensive of 1944.Some chetnik were killed some were rewarded by Tito's regime by making them state official,and were given big privileges.

 

ok

 

In some parts certain cethnik vojvoda were fighting alongside the Germans,especially in Macedonia it is noteworthy to give the name Chetnik vojvoda Kosta Pecanec whose movement was neutralized in the February offensive of 1944.Some chetnik were killed some were rewarded by Tito's regime by making them state official,and were given big privileges.

 

Mark,
I remembered your sentence today when I was looking for which fighter unit provided cover for Halyard mission.
Freeman published additional chapter available on Kobo, called "Red tails: The Tuskegee Airmen and Operation Halyard"

I was expecting too much when I thought that James Alonza Walker, only Tuskegee airmen rescued by chetniks would be mentioned. Especially since he stayed in contact with men who helped him, which is nice story. But no, story is only about providing air cover.

But recently I got 332fg History, and as I went through I realized that Red Tails actually didn't flew cover on Halyard mission evacuations. Not only on August 10, as most massive, but also on any other. Not a single mission.
Author took testimony given for evacuation on August 22nd (and Halyard evacuations were on August 10, 26-27-28).
Brezna evacuation was on August 22nd, and it was very big - more than 1000 wounded with some 16 american airmen were evacuated on that day. Only problem is that it had nothing to do with chetniks - it was partisans who were being evacuated.

It is amazing that author writing on Halyard mission failed to do almost any research. Summary of Halyard mission evacuation gives not only total number of evacuated, but also dates, nationalities etc.