Re: Book review: Red Wings Over the Yalu: China,the Soviet Union and the Ai...

[Joe Brennan <jbren1@optonline.net>]

> A friend of mine told me that there were circumstancial evidences showing
> that it was Soviets' kill.  Chinese credited the kill to Ji-Hui Chang.

If you search back in the archives of this list there's a longer note by me
in a previous discussion of Red Wings summarizing X. Zhang's treatment of
the subject plus other things I found. I think the Chinese claim is more
likely the valid one, and the Soviet claim more likely describes the bold
attack of another pair of F-86's, led by Douglas Evans, on an large group of
MiG's, but Evans (like the great majority of claimed F-86's) wasn't actually
downed. The key would be the account of George Davis' wingman in Larry
Davis' "4th FIW in Korea" which suggests he may have downed the Chinese
pilot after Davis was shot down, offering a way out of the big problem in
the Chinese claim: how the Chinese ace could have been downed himself while
claiming Davis when no other US pilots were awarded victories.

I still don't think either opinion on this can be proved though, without
other information. Red Wings draws no conclusion on this. At least one other
often published Chinese claim (the RB-29 shot down Jan 12 1953 with crew
captured in China and held til 1955) seems to be a case where not only was
the plane clearly downed by the Russians but the Chinese must know it. But I
think we can say the Davis case is not in that category at all, both allies
have a reason of prestige to maintain the Davis claim but the truth is not
clear.

Joe
 ----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jack Hwang" <jackchwang@comcast.net>
To: <KOREAN-WAR-L@listproc.cc.ku.edu>
Sent: Monday, July 21, 2003 4:26 PM
Subject: RE: Book review: Red Wings Over the Yalu: China, the Soviet Union
and the Ai...


> > George Davis' shootdown was a bonus for them, but to this day both
> > the Chinese and Soviets claim they shot him down so the real victor is
> unknown.
>
> A friend of mine told me that there were circumstancial evidences showing
> that it was Soviets' kill.  Chinese credited the kill to Ji-Hui Chang.
> However,
> Chang himself was also shot down in the same battle while his wingman,
> Zhi-Yu Dan, was killed.  Interestingly, there seemed to be no other US
claim
> of shooting down MiGs other than George Davis' two kills reported by his
> wingman.
>
> Does anyone have more info?
>
> Thanks
>
> Jack Hwang
>
>