How a Corsair Pilot Got a Kill with No Weapons 

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This was my Fathers WW2 Squadron VMF 312 . He caught heck when the planes landed as he was in charge of the 50 caliber M2 machine guns that failed to fire. He stated and they checked they were clean to specs The plane had an electronic firing solenoid that apparently failed in the cold at high altitude What they did not say is that the Japanese Pilot continued to attempt to unjam his machine gun just yards from the Marine pilot! ( Dad says he even peed on the gun! Brave men.- on both sides The F4U Corsairs would fly a few hundred miles North of Okinawa to try and intercept the kamikaze Pilots that were so effective sinking many ships and killing thousands of sailors Also video shows Corsair diving down on plane Action report shows Corsair pilot was only gaining on plane very very slowly He slowly chopped into the tail, lost airspeed, fell back and did it again all the while Japanese gunner looking right at him with the machine gun pointed in his face. The Marine pilots prop was NOT bent back but had the ends broken off allowing it to fly

The Corsair was ( and still is ) a magnificent aircraft...And a fast lethal killing machine...

This plane was also the star of one of my all-time favorite TV war dramas (Black Sheep Squadron) where actors Robert Conrad and others definitely sang the praises of this great plane........difficult to fly especially during landings but superior in the hands of US pilots over Zeroes in almost every way!! Jim C.

Klingman was brave as hell. Well done sir.

Thanks for watching everyone! Remember - The extra aircraft that you see in this video are real TJ3 History viewers playing War Thunder with me! If you want to join, make sure to download War Thunder and join my discord in the video description! See you next week!

Terrific story! Unbelievable heroism of that pilot. And a great video to boot. Thanks for uploading. 👌

I served 18 months at USARAL ( United States ARmy ALaska). Reading this story made me wish I coulda sent information back through time. We kept our M1 Garands functioning by using powdered graphite as a lubricant instead of oil. In as warm as -20 farenheit, oil would start to congeal. The firing pin would freeze inside its bore and would not reach the primer. This involve detail-stripping the bolt and trigger group to remove any trace of oil. Company armorer helped us here. On their guns, the moving parts can be lubricated. The coil in the solenoid has to be sealed and electrically isolated since graphite is electrical conductor and can short everything out. Our Garands would function at -81 farenheit.

Wow, what a story. He was awarded the Navy Cross. He also was an enlisted Marine in the 1930s, discharged and opened a burger café before WW2. Amazing normal type American guy. Retired in 1966!

So not only did he get a kill and come in for a safe, yet dangerous landing, he also inadvertantly turned his aircraft into a kamikaze plane...

There was a similar incident a few years before that one actually. In November 2 of 1940 the Greek Royal Airforce pilot Marinos Mitralexis was able to take down an Italian bomber Cant Z1007 with the propeller of his PZL. He was out of ammo and decided to hit the tail of the bomber making it unable to fly and going down in a crash. Marinos Mitralexis landed his own damaged PZL and walked near the surviving crew that had beild out (4 out of 5) and after a salute he arrested them. The Italian crew was brought at the Greek base where they were treated nicely and exchanged their I.D.'s with the Greek pilots. Maybe a video about this incident would be nice.

While I was in the Marines, we had a Corsair, Blue Max, park on our flight line. It was beautiful!

So basically a damaged Corsair that safely landed for a kill on a craft that other craft couldn't reach and which was coordinating kamikaze attacks. Seems like a win!

The German Luftwaffe had an entire squadron dedicated to that. "Commando Elbe" or "Rammflieger" .

hellcat, corsair and P47 jug had YUGE kill ratios

I'm addicted to your videos they just way too cool also in my home town in slovakia there was a actual pilot who fought in the battle of britain dogfights!

Guy would take on impossible odds to save others lives ,Out standing man.

A book I read about planes ¨Wings Of War¨ apparently Major Thomas Hardy part of VMF312 says that they called the Japanese surveillance plane known as ¨Nick¨ He also tells us the missions the corsairs took part in (btw. Page for this story is at 156 and chapter in is killer corsairs)

That’s a great story, and you did a wonderful job of presenting it! I’m so glad I subscribed to your channel. You always do a great job presenting interesting stories I’ve never heard before.

True story. The movie the Great Santini which came out in 1979 used the pictures of the Corsair’s that they took out of our ready room for the movie. That was my squadron and i’am in the ready room scene when Robert Duvall is talking about the squadron and you can hack it or you can pack It. There was several aircrew that are in the movie and did the flying scenes that got killed in accidents within just two years of making that movie. The real Great Santini “Donald Conroy” got to watch the filming of the F-4s fly the missing man formation over his funeral and ten years later F-18s flew over his funeral in the missing man formation. He said that he is the only man to get to watch his own funeral.

Thank you Sir for the wonderful story 🙏

Just for those curious which Ki-45 was used that is the Ki-45 Tei which in game is armed with 1 nose mounted 37mm cannon and 2 angled 20mm cannons. Reason why because this variant is ment for bomber hunting.

Wow! Awesome story. Thank you TJ.

Great story, thanks for sharing!

What a great true story!! Well done clankman inclinement! The point thanks for sharing this with us.

Wow, great video. Thank you TJ.

This should be named "The ramm of the frozen guns"! Absolutely great presentation: the commentary, the visuals, the editing. Many thanks!

All the time you hear these stories about the allies and how they pulled such situations off. I want to know if the axis had such stories.

I can’t believe it’s finally out I’ve been so excited for this episode your awesome TJ thank you for all the great videos

Most awesome story of all the TJ3 videos!

Literally the best pilot ever. Even survivng korean war, rip❤

Corsair is a really bizarre WW2 aircraft!

As a child in my motherland, mes amis, I read the memoirs of a chap who was a combat pilote of one of these in WWII. He claimed that the Flight Manual stated that the glide-characteristics were SO poor, that if the engine stopped, you should bail-out (if high enough) ... OR 'Whistle A Happy Tune and Kiss Your Ass Goodbye '! ... because a 'dead-stick’ landing was very iffy.

Great Graphics and Story. Thanks.

Thank you for the excellent story!

Great vid, thanks.

a great and intresting story nice one tj

This is my most favorite ww2 planes Enjoyed your video and I gave it a Thumbs Up

Amazing and just awesome!

Great video!

Great story 😎👌

Must have been a stripped out Ki-45 if it took 1.5 hours for a Corsair to catch up. Or it might have been a Ki-46 (nicknamed 'Dinah', a much faster twin engined plane).

I really enjoy your videos and this one was no exception. But can I suggest that you change your background music and commentary mix just a little bit and lessen the music level. The mix on this particular video was very difficult for me to hear all the details. Just food for thought. Keep up the otherwise good work.

Great Upload, Excellent viewing Thaaaaaaaaaaaaankyou 👍🤪

its always a good day when u upload

Outstanding

Something similar happened to me with my JU-87 Stuka in warthunder

A brave man. RIP

Im just commenting to let the algorithim reccomend this great channel to other people

AMAZING !!!

Great story

Pretty much had the same thing happen to me to in some indie ww2 plane simulator, i already got a shot on the first engine of the bomber, but it was still keeping up with the rest of the bomber formation so i came closer and shot up his engine, being greedy i tried shooting more but instead hitting the bomber and both going in an uncontrollable dive, i managed to recover and convienently was near a friendly airfield and succesfully landed despite losing the prop, the bomber recovered too and tried to catch up with his formation but he has 2 smoking engines but was too focused on landing my plane to see whether it went down and by the time i landed my spitfire he was too far to be seen.

Serious Brass Ballz !!! Semper Phi !

so neat story

Saw a painting about this. Strange but true.

Pilot after realizing he has no weapons: oh s****, not good.

Very interesting event 👍... certainly took some initiative

Bravo Zulu (Well Done), sir.

Not me replicating this in a corsair on WT, one of my favorite stories

I'm amazed from an engineering perspective that two of the 4 planes' engines couldn't make it to the altitude but the other 2 could, I wonder if the two that did were fresher newer planes or the variance because of loose tolerances and manufacturing was so wide back then. That's a huge performance difference in the same design.

You can read a good account of this encounter in Gordon Baxters' book, "Bax Seat", his collection of essays from Flying magazine.

Nice!!!!

That almost was like to make Japan taste its own medicine

I remember one time I had a bomber running trying to run the timer down and win. We found him, but he quickly started shooting down our teammates. With time running out I swooped in with one goal in mind. Kill him even if I had to ram him to do it. With my aircraft on fire I rammed his tail and knocked it off. We won the match with seconds to spare.

What a dude !

Always wanted to ask: What's the background music you use in each video?

This type fighter patrol became the basis of what the USN will develop as the Big Blue Blanket.

Outstanding !. The World's Finest US Marine Aviation. Swing with the Wing. Semper Fi

That guy is a true bad ass 🇺🇸

The dog chow boys are a great group of people.

„My son, you are the ammo“

I know Robert Klingman's nephew. Grew up in the same county in Oklahoma as he did.

the corsair were not able to fly at 35000 feet

Remember "don't all good stories involve pirates (Corsair)?" The History Guy🏴‍☠️

The most marine thing I've ever heard. Innovative and stupid. Amazing

Don't know what to look for to add you to warthunder seeing how I play it more than the other sometimes

Great video but you got his name wrong, it's actually Robert "Balls of Steel" Klingman. ;)

Good morning to all from SE. Louisiana 30 Aug 22.

There are so many stories like this from WW II. A lot of them from the enemy as well who did some honorable things for the good guys. It's to bad WE THE PEOPLE(S) of our individual countries can't keep the criminals that put us into these wars out of power.

reminiscent of ( Luftwaffe ) Sonderkommando Elbe fighters , although the ( German ) tactic of ramming an enemy (U.S ) bomber was premeditated , rather than a spontaneous act

5:37 about you can see the map from war thunder

Did the Japanese recon plane not already radio in the fleet's location? Why risk your life and airplane? Just wondering please explain

Sir TJ3 History, I have a recommendation for a video. It's the story were a brave F4F Wildcat pilot from the Cactus airforce downed a Japanese bomber with his landing gear that was attacking US ships at Guadalcanal. This was reported by the USS Helena crew who saw it, I know the story might be fake, but it's a cool stroy nonetheless.

Ships? They are planes!

is ki-45 the original u-2?

HEROISM like this is alive today in today's Military Pilots and Ground Crews. Thanks for your service one and all who serve to Protect the Freedoms we ALL enjoy to this day.....NOW VOTE to keep it this way. JUST SAYIN'

F4u Corsair is Skipper from planes 2013

alternate title: When the kamikazi-ers got kamikazied

I was right you do use war thunder for your videos I thought this graphics looked familiar!

warthunder yeahhhhh

I thought the KI-45 have a rear machine gun? Surprised to see the Japanese gunner did nothing while the Corsair slowly caught up to it.

I get the impression the Japanese didn't bother equipping any of their pilots with parachutes.

good video, however from what I have read he slowly ate away at one rear flight surfaces and the enemy slowly spiraled down. also corsairs had wooden props, not bent steel as shown in your video.

That had to have been worth a DFC at minimum!

35,000 feet above the ocean ?? LOL

I’m not in to games but thanks !!

Each pilot fired off 2,000 rounds? B/S! You were maybe going to have a few hundred per gun

When you don’t have ammo, YOU BECOME THE AMMO

The red baron

Let us know when you get a decal