Nanjing honors heroes of 'Hump Airlift'
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E-mail China Daily, August 3, 2015
Severed lifelines
In July 1937, a gunbattle at Lugou Bridge - also known as the Marco Polo Bridge-in Beijing signaled the start of Japan's invasion of China. Although the Japanese occupied several major cities, including Beijing, Shanghai and Nanjing, the war quickly reached a stalemate.
The severing of all the supply lines on land and at sea left China isolated and in desperate need of supplies, without which it could not hope to survive.
The Hump Airlift was the only feasible response, but its success came at a high price and took a huge toll on both men and machines.
"China and the US allocated 2,200 aircraft and more than 84,000 people to transport more than 740,000 tons of supplies and 33,477 combatants via the Hump," Sun said. "Those airlifts became aerial lifelines for China."
The 100 aircraft owned by CNAC, the only commercial airline involved in the operation, transported 74,809 metric tons of supplies in 43,611 flights.
"The airlift was the longest, most dangerous and most difficult in the history of global aviation," Sun said. "Both countries made enormous sacrifices to achieve it."
According to the literature at the memorial hall, many pilots preferred to take the northern route, which was far more difficult to fly than the southern one, to avoid Japanese fighter planes. Irrespective of the route they chose, however, they still had to negotiate high mountains and contend with adverse weather conditions on the "Routes of Death", as many of the pilots called them.
"More than 1,500 pilots and aircrew members lost their lives in the Hump Airlift," Sun said. "More than 500 aircraft crashed, of which 468 belonged to the US. About one-third of the 103 pilots and aircrew employed by the China National Aviation Corp were Americans."
About 100 of the downed planes have never been located, meaning their crews have never been formally honored.
'Aluminum Valley'
The hall's literature tells of how one former hump pilot always referred to the airlift as "Aluminum Valley", because on clear days the crews could see the glistening wreckage of crashed aircraft scattered in the valleys below.
Luo said 990 newly identified martyrs - 586 Chinese and 404 US nationals - will have their names and stories engraved in the hall by August 15. The number of heroes will rise to 4,295, with US nationals accounting for more than 60 percent of the total.
Li Juan, director of the Nanjing Aviators' Association, said the process of finding and identifying the fallen is often difficult and time-consuming. "We have to check the information with known materials, foreign embassies and authorities, including defense departments," he said.
"The association will continue to work with aviation organizations and museums in Taiwan, HongKong, the US and Russia to identify more martyrs.
All the relevant information, including name, rank or title, hometown, dates of birth and death, military experience and cause of death will be recorded. Some relatives have asked for more details so they can learn more about their family's lost heroes.
"We pay our respects to the heroes by identifying them, engraving their names in marble and reuniting them with their old comrades, the men they fought side by side with."
Luo, the hall's deputy director, said researching personal histories and the conflict proved difficult because many of the men were very young when they died.
"The average age of the heroes who were killed was 23," Luo said. "Some of them have been forgotten by posterity and aren't remembered at all. Also, very few experts in China conduct research into the history of Chinese aviation, while the number of experts researching the country's history during World War II is small."
"We'll continue to keep history in mind, commemorate the martyrs, and cherish our life today," he said.
For Sun, the Hump pilots and aircrews are the forgotten heroes of China's WWII history. "The people who flew the airlift may not be as famous and glamorous as the Flying Tigers, but they transported every single gallon of fuel and every bullet used on the battlefield," she said.
"The history of the Hump Airlift was written in the blood of these young heroes. We will always remember their names and hold them close in our hearts."
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