Neptunus Lex brings us yet another poignant production that celebrates the WW2 P-51 Mustang fighter plane, the men who flew them, and the portal that one of these aircraft provided across generational lines: The desire for the younger to truly understand the experienced of the elder. The short film “Gray Eagles”, by Chris Wood, is a must see, and a visit to the Gray Eagles Foundation website is a must go…
The lessons are deep…
When I lived in Corona, California, I had the privilege of living within the flight patterns of the Chino Planes of Fame museum, home of a multitude of refurbished warbirds from almost every era. It was rare not to be able to look up every day to see some sort of WW2 fighter snarling through the skies, high above my head.
Snarling… A WW2 fighter isn’t like your “polite” civilian prop-driven airplanes. Each breed of plane, be it a P-51 Mustang, F4U Corsair, or FW190 has a distinctive ripping snarling sound created by its power plant, and it is easy to hear an implied threat in that sound. These were aircraft designed for a single, deadly purpose: To knock other similar types of aircraft from the sky. To this day, an aircraft designed to enter into combat has a version of that threatening sound, as they are not built to succor the ears of the general public with the sweet siren song of the joys of flight; they are made to answer the demands of the human being in the cockpit, whose very life depends on the abilities of his or her steed to find victory not only over the perils of simple flight (which will kill one with obscene ease alone), but also over the determinations of a like-minded individual on the “other” side. Any presumed beauty of the aircraft is secondary. By happy coincidence, there are those aircraft that can join functionality with beauty, though it be a “shotgun” wedding.
One cannot, however, see only the aircraft, for without a pilot at the controls, the aircraft is simply a construct of silent metal, plastic, rubber, carbon fiber, and thousands of hours of engineering and construction work. It is the pilot who straps this beast upon his or her back and takes to the sky, hopefully under the auspices of some noble purpose (the cause of freedom, for example) to bring the fight to the face of an evil enemy. It is the pilot, trained in the mathematics of flight dynamics, schooled in tactics learned through the blood of too many others who came before, garnished with the responsibilities of leadership in The Service. The best pilots combine all of these, as well as a healthy dose of Luck, and become that iconic warrior: The Fighter Pilot.
The Fighter Pilot, however, is but a part of the whole, and each conjunction of humanity and technology creates another element within that whole. Helicopter Pilot and Gunship, Artilleryman and Howitzer, Rifleman and Rifle, Bomber Pilot and Bomber… Each conjunction creates a joining of man and machine, and these conjunctions enjoy relationships with other conjunctions, the teamwork of the Rifleman on the ground, and the Strike Fighter Pilot in his or her Close Air Support role for example…
Each of these conjunctions surround themselves with myths and legends, and create boundaries within which they enjoy their own, singular notoriety. Riflemen shall not consort with Tankers. Cobra Driver shall not sup with B-52 Driver. C-130 crews shall not rub elbows with F-4 Wild Weasels. Army shall not drink with Air Force. Marines shall not hoist pints with any but their own (except when their cousins in the Other Naval Service come calling…)
Every now and again, however, a Rifleman lifts his eyes from the rifle he is cleaning, and watches as the Other Guy, in that Other Machine, carves a path across the clouds with wing man in tow, headed off to commit some violence upon the heads of some distant enemy. The Rifleman, if he be a cerebral thinker, might wonder wistfully at the community of that Other Guy, and for a while wonders what it would be like to shed ruck, rifle, and the mud-soaked life of the Infantry, and garb himself in Nomex and Speed-jeans to experience what it is like to be That Guy.
There are those veterans of each community who have valiantly put pen to paper in an attempt to describe their own experiences to the world. Some, like Lex, have done the world a great service in authoring magnificent essays pertaining to their own contributions to being The Other Guy, and have given the world a taste of their exploits, but even such fetes of literary gold cannot immerse the reader in the experience of getting kicked in the butt during a cat shot, or elicit the combination of terror and excitement of sliding a UH-1 into a hot Landing Zone to rescue a wounded grunt while under fire.
The members of the community of Man and Machine do not share enough commonality to understand the nuances of their respective niches, but they do share enough to appreciate each of the others Worst Day Ever. We can share the catharsis enough to provide a comfort to one another, whether it was watching a buddy go down in flames, auto-rotate into a greasy fireball, or share the last moments of life with a squaddie in the middle of The Firefight. Memories that we would like to forget, but that must be explored and digested to prevent too much scar tissue from warping all that is the rest of us.
It’s the Other Stories, the Good Times, the view through the gunsight when Death is not the final act, but something that provokes a snicker or wry grin. They are the most enjoyable : A pair of amorous teenagers in a quiet wooded sanctuary- unaware of the squad of TOW gunners watching them from a mile away through the thermal night sight, or the periscope recording from an Attack submarine as it watches a yacht in the middle of the ocean where the Master- Him- and Mate- Her- are on deck, “horizontal and superimposed”…
Across generations, or across technology, it is the stories of these separate – but-conjoined communities that the world must know and respect, and I am gratified to hear each and every one of them, and tell a few of my own.
