2022 Report to Congress

[skymaster]

Skymaster,

Thank you for some really interesting information.

BTW, if you know, in the picture of the GOs at the Capital, the GASDF 1-Star that is second from the left (viewer's right), is he wearing an Honest John/Pershing Missile Crewman's Badge (Center Left Pocket) or is that some Georgia specific badge, I'm unaware of?

That would be the U.S. Army (Master Rating) Field Artillery Missileman Badge in this official DOD photo of that officer when he was a (then) Brigadier General. He is actually one of my neighbors at our place up near the lake, and I know him on a first name basis. At his State of Georgia auxiliary retirement ceremony, in accordance with Georgia tradition, the Governor awarded him one grade higher than his serving grade for one day as a retirement gift, so he is actually a retired auxiliary Major General. He retired as a full Colonel after a distinguished career in the U.S. Army. Other than the nameplate, the GA collar brass, and the lower 6 ribbons on his uniform, everything else on his uniform was earned in the active Army and the Army Reserve.

As an aside, the other then-Auxiliary Brigadier General in the Capitol photo is now on active duty as an Army General Officer (and he has a twin brother who is also now an active duty Army General Officer). And both of them were classmates of mine back at the same military college that we all attended way back in the day. All of them very intelligent, professional, and well spoken individuals.
 

[Shuman 14]

Cool! Army Missilemen Badge holders are a rare breed. Once the Army went non-nuclear, they faded away quickly.

[skymaster]

Below is an AF Public Affairs info site about the JSTARS system mentioned in the Report To Congress and what it does, for those who might be interested.

AF JSTARS Public Affairs Fact Sheet

While this type mission for CAP is performed by aircraft from states closer to the main base for this project, it is still indicative of the kind of mission that CAP can do in support of the Active Duty AF and the Air Force Reserve. As Air Force Reserve Command is headquartered out of the same base as this mission, it gives CAP a prime opportunity to demonstrate the kind of non-combatant support of Air Force entities that CAP is authorized to do under Federal Law, showing that CAP can support Reserve forces as well. And that support, professionally performed by CAP personnel, could open the doors to more varied support missions in the future.

This is an opportunity for CAP to get back to its earlier roots of military service support. This mission, in its own 2023 way, helps the AF attune their instruments to detect and identify smaller aircraft targets, much as our historical forebears did in 1942 helping train antiaircraft operators to track possible aircraft targets as shown in this Atlanta Constitution article.



To see what CAP can do, one only needs to demonstrate what has been done successfully and professionally in the past, and maybe update variations of those missions for the world of 2023 and beyond.

[baronet68]

...those Ercoupes (including the personal Ercoupe of Georgia Air Patrol Commander and state legislator Lt Col Robert Ferguson) carried observers who not only helped run the radios, but acted as air gunners as well, initially using state-issued Thompson .45 caliber submachineguns. These were later upgraded with captured WWI-relic German MG08 machineguns converted to 30.06 caliber air cooled versions by Georgia State Guard 27th District Commander Lt Col Mark Cooper at the armory in Rome, and replaced by AAF demolition bombs on orders of AAF General Arnold when the national CAP began an expanded version of the Coastal Patrol mission. The Thompsons were repurposed to the CAP Border Patrol mission. Photos below of Col Ferguson and his Ercoupe in government service were made by LIFE photographer William Shrout at a Coastal Patrol exercise in November of 1941. 

There must have been some serious modifications to the 1941 Ercoupe to make it fly like that with a 2-man crew. 

The '41 Ercoupe had a 65hp engine with a useful load of only 426 pounds.  A 14 gal fuel capacity uses 84 pounds of that load.  Add two 1940's era guys at 150 pounds each along with the stripped down weight of an MG08 (~58 pounds) and the plane is 16 pounds over gross.  They'd have to leave the gunner behind in order to load any ammunition or bombs.

[skymaster]

Someone asked offline if a higher resolution image of the "CAP on Active Duty" newspaper clipping was available. Here it is.

https://i.imgur.com/u3IxK4P.jpg

[skymaster]

...those Ercoupes (including the personal Ercoupe of Georgia Air Patrol Commander and state legislator Lt Col Robert Ferguson) carried observers who not only helped run the radios, but acted as air gunners as well, initially using state-issued Thompson .45 caliber submachineguns. These were later upgraded with captured WWI-relic German MG08 machineguns converted to 30.06 caliber air cooled versions by Georgia State Guard 27th District Commander Lt Col Mark Cooper at the armory in Rome, and replaced by AAF demolition bombs on orders of AAF General Arnold when the national CAP began an expanded version of the Coastal Patrol mission. The Thompsons were repurposed to the CAP Border Patrol mission. Photos below of Col Ferguson and his Ercoupe in government service were made by LIFE photographer William Shrout at a Coastal Patrol exercise in November of 1941. 

There must have been some serious modifications to the 1941 Ercoupe to make it fly like that with a 2-man crew. 

The '41 Ercoupe had a 65hp engine with a useful load of only 426 pounds.  A 14 gal fuel capacity uses 84 pounds of that load.  Add two 1940's era guys at 150 pounds each along with the stripped down weight of an MG08 (~58 pounds) and the plane is 16 pounds over gross.  They'd have to leave the gunner behind in order to load any ammunition or bombs.

They were fortunate enough to have the mechanical and aeronautical engineering prowess of the likes of such notable CAP members as James Harry Epps (of the famous Epps aviation family) and William D. Hicks who were able to maximize the performance and interaction of aviator and machine and push their limits within the technology of the time, to perform the missions required of CAP during those early days of World War II. But, they did so with safety foremost in their minds. While a very few aircraft were lost in the line of CAP duty (such as Tom Daniel's Bellanca) those modifications actually saved lives, and no Georgia CAP member was lost in the line of duty. And, they did their jobs so well, even the Army and Navy made use of their  training and expertise, and those trained by them, during the war. When those Ercoupes were used armed with guns, they were not flying with a full fuel load, and they had the boat patrols of the Georgia State Guard Volunteer Navy that CAP worked with to pluck them from the coastal waters if they did have to ditch, and many beaches to use as emergency landing strips, as Coastal Patrol mission training included beach landings as a practiced procedure.