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The Navigation Case: Training, Flying and Fighting the 1942 to 1945 New Guinea War
The Navigation Case reveals the drama and sacrifice expended by America’s pioneering pilots’ first ever demonstration of air superiority, during the greatest campaign in U.S. Air Force history.
An aged and glossy leather briefcase was discovered when our family house was cleaned out and sold. We came to learn that my father had meticulously collected his military documents, private letters, and souvenirs, and packed them away in this—his pilot’s navigation case.
From randomly within, a newspaper article tumbled out. It described a massive typhoon in New Guinea causing “horror and tragedy” and resulting in incredible untold loss of men and aircraft. But larger questions remained What was my father, or any American, doing in New Guinea, of all places? If America was fighting Japan, why were we fighting in New Guinea?
Aviation as an industry was in its infancy. The sagas of pioneering pilots detail fascinating but deadly cadet training and violent air missions. The narrative flourishes into an incredible story giving the context for all the Pacific war stories from Pearl Harbor, Guadalcanal, Midway island, and Iwo Jima, up to the avoidable catastrophes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
An aged and glossy leather briefcase was discovered when our family house was cleaned out and sold. We came to learn that my father had meticulously collected his military documents, private letters, and souvenirs, and packed them away in this—his pilot’s navigation case.
From randomly within, a newspaper article tumbled out. It described a massive typhoon in New Guinea causing “horror and tragedy” and resulting in incredible untold loss of men and aircraft. But larger questions remained What was my father, or any American, doing in New Guinea, of all places? If America was fighting Japan, why were we fighting in New Guinea?
Aviation as an industry was in its infancy. The sagas of pioneering pilots detail fascinating but deadly cadet training and violent air missions. The narrative flourishes into an incredible story giving the context for all the Pacific war stories from Pearl Harbor, Guadalcanal, Midway island, and Iwo Jima, up to the avoidable catastrophes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
320 pages, Hardcover
Published November 23, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
November 29, 2021
My bias aside-this is wonderful read. It delves into all the things the men who fought in WWII never talked about. Also interesting to read on the New Guinea Black Sunday disaster.
Highly recommend.
Highly recommend.
August 3, 2022
I'm not sure how I heard of this unjustly obscure book, but I did, and I'm glad I did. It was a great read.
The author, John E. Happ, is a Chicago native, as was his father, Leonard "Len" Happ. John knew Len had served as a pilot in WWII, but like many veterans of that era, Len never talked about the war. In fact, John did not even know that his father had served in the Pacific, fighting against the Japanese.
That is, until his father died, and in the family house John found an Army-issue navigation case which Len had used to store correspondence from the war. John then undertook a decades-long effort to research his father's military service, which started when Len, a private pilot, volunteered for the US Army Air Corp in January 1942. It wasn't until mid-1943 that Len saw action, flying ground attack missions in New Guinea.
As it happens, I have a personal connection to this theater as well - a great uncle served there. All he ever said about his service was that the place was hot and wet and the natives ran around naked. Len never said even that much.
The book is a mixture of Len's personal story of training and combat, interspersed with a solid layman's history of a slog of a campaign, conducted by under-supplied US and Australian forces fighting in what was then literally an uncharted land. Len's service in New Guinea was exemplarily, and Len was rotated back to the US after over 60 combat missions. There he flew medical transport planes, until an unexplained medical issue grounded Len. A few months later, Len was discharged, and he returned to civilian life.
Overall, I found the book a very good read and an interesting story. It will shed a light on an underappreciated theater of WWII. My only complaint was that the maps in this book were hard to read, but that's a quibble. Overall, I recommend this book.
The author, John E. Happ, is a Chicago native, as was his father, Leonard "Len" Happ. John knew Len had served as a pilot in WWII, but like many veterans of that era, Len never talked about the war. In fact, John did not even know that his father had served in the Pacific, fighting against the Japanese.
That is, until his father died, and in the family house John found an Army-issue navigation case which Len had used to store correspondence from the war. John then undertook a decades-long effort to research his father's military service, which started when Len, a private pilot, volunteered for the US Army Air Corp in January 1942. It wasn't until mid-1943 that Len saw action, flying ground attack missions in New Guinea.
As it happens, I have a personal connection to this theater as well - a great uncle served there. All he ever said about his service was that the place was hot and wet and the natives ran around naked. Len never said even that much.
The book is a mixture of Len's personal story of training and combat, interspersed with a solid layman's history of a slog of a campaign, conducted by under-supplied US and Australian forces fighting in what was then literally an uncharted land. Len's service in New Guinea was exemplarily, and Len was rotated back to the US after over 60 combat missions. There he flew medical transport planes, until an unexplained medical issue grounded Len. A few months later, Len was discharged, and he returned to civilian life.
Overall, I found the book a very good read and an interesting story. It will shed a light on an underappreciated theater of WWII. My only complaint was that the maps in this book were hard to read, but that's a quibble. Overall, I recommend this book.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews