One Hundred Years of Flight USAF Chronology ... - The Air University

1942
March 6: The Army Air School at Tuskegee, Alabama, graduated the first
five black military pilots, including Capt. Benjamin O. Davis, Jr.
March 9: By executive order, the War Department reorganized into three
autonomous sections: Army Air Forces, Army Ground Forces, and Services
of Supply. The Air Corps continued to exist as a combatant arm
of the Army.
April 8: Two DC–3 aircraft acquired by the Army from Pan American Airlines
airlifted gasoline and lubricating oil over the Himalaya Mountains from
Dinjan in eastern India to Yunnan-yi in southern China. A total of eight
such airplanes carried enough fuel and oil over the “Hump” to refuel
and service U.S. B–25 bombers expected to land in China after a secret
raid on Tokyo from an aircraft carrier in the Pacific. This marked the
beginning of World War II’s largest airlift, which delivered Allied supplies
from India to China after the Japanese cut the Burma Road.
The B–25 Mitchell bomber. Sixteen such bombers took off from the aircraft carrier
USS Hornet to carry out the Doolittle raid on Tokyo, Japan.
April 18: Col. James H. “Jimmy” Doolittle led 16 B–25s from the aircraft carrier
Hornet to bomb Tokyo and other sites in the first U.S. air raid on
Japan. Because of the range, the raiders had to crash-land in China.
Although the raid caused little destruction, it raised U.S. morale and
damaged that of the Japanese, reversing what had seemed to be an
endless stream of Japanese victories. For leading this mission, Doolittle
earned the Medal of Honor.
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