The logistics were amazing, and appalling. Each B-29 sortie required 20 tons of fuel, munitions and supplies. These were carried to the Chinese bases by B-29 transports, each of which burnt 28 tons of fuel to shift a 4.5-ton payload. The shuttle was soon taken over by C-109 aircraft, to spare the bombers. Flying the Hump airlift to Kunming was one of the most dangerous and unpopular missions of the war, involving a cumulative loss of 450 aircraft. Crew efficiency and morale were notoriously low. Airmen obliged to bail out found themselves in some of the wildest country in the world, populated
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