Description

Here is your chance to pick up a wonderful A-2 jacket. I would rate this as a medium in size. All insignia is original to the jacket however it should be noted that his officer rank bars were removed. The jacket is named to Bob Crouse, a B-24 pilot within the 727th Bomb Squadron who flew out of Italy within the 15th Air Force and was attached to the 451st Bomb Group. Near the collar is a lucky charm which reads “THE LUCKY LITTLE BELL OF SAN MICHELLE” and is a most unique trinket to the jacket. Click HERE to view more images of this item!Click HERE for history on the 727th Bomb Squadron!The Pacific theater was America’s main front following Pearl Harbor. The Imperial Japanese Navy had the advantage, taking the Philippines as well as British and Dutch possessions, and threatening Australia. But in June 1942, its main carriers were sunk during the Battle of Midway and the Americans seized the initiative. The Pacific War became a campaign of island hopping, with the moving air bases closer and closer to Japan. The Army, based in Australia under General Douglas MacArthur, steadily advanced across New Guinea to the Philippines, with plans to invade the Japanese home islands in late 1945. With its merchant fleet sunk by American submarines, Japan ran short of aviation gasoline and fuel oil, as the U.S. Navy in June 1944 captured islands within bombing range of the Japanese home islands. Strategic bombing directed by General Curtis Lemay destroyed all the major Japanese cities, and the U.S. captured Okinawa after heavy losses in spring 1945. With the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Soviet invasion of Manchuria, and an invasion of the home islands imminent, the Japanese surrendered.The war in Europe involved aid to Britain, her allies, and the Soviet Union, with the U.S. supplying munitions until it could ready an invasion force. U.S. forces were first tested to a limited degree in the North African Campaign and then employed more significantly with British Forces in Italy in 1943–45. The main invasion of France took place on June 6th, 1944, under General Dwight D. Eisenhower. Meanwhile, the U.S. Army Air Forces and the British Royal Air Force engaged in the area bombardment of German cities and systematically targeted German transportation links and synthetic oil plants, as it knocked out what was left of the Luftwaffe post Battle of Britain in 1944. Being invaded from all sides, it became clear that Germany would lose the war. Free shipping ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD & I don’t charge PayPal fees like some of the other guys!