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as we all know, the p-38 fighter jet was a great success in the pacific theater. it not only suppressed the zero fighter and the ki-43 "falcon", gave birth to the two top american record leaders, bong and mcgea, and also successfully assassinated yamamoto go. sixteen.

in comparison, the p-38's shine in europe was much dimmer. the lack of heating in the early stage froze the pilots half to death. however, there is such a pilot whose experience can be described as a combination of boldness, luck, and superb skills. he single-handedly raised the image of the p-38. let's take a look at his story.

▲the p-38 performed well in the pacific, created a large number of ace pilots, and successfully assassinated isoroku yamamoto.

the protagonist of the story is jack ilfrey, who was born in 1920 from houston, texas. he completed civilian pilot training at the age of 19, joined the u.s. army air forces in april 1941, and was awarded the rank of second lieutenant in december.

at this time, the united states had entered the war, and lieutenant ilfrey was initially assigned to the 94th squadron, 1st fighter group, flying p-38 fighter jets and stationed in the united kingdom.

after operation torch in november 1942, the 1st fighter group needed to move from britain to north africa. november 15th was the day when second lieutenant ilfrey made the transition. two auxiliary fuel tanks were mounted under his wings to cope with long-distance flights at sea.

unfortunately, en route, lieutenant ilfrey discovered that one of the auxiliary fuel tanks had malfunctioned and could not suck fuel. this way he would definitely not be able to fly to north africa, so in desperation he chose to land at an airport in portugal.

▲second lieutenant ilfrey’s landline phone.

▲the protagonist, second lieutenant ilfrey, the aircraft in the photo is his first p-38f.

when lieutenant ilfrey landed, he discovered that things were not that simple. it turns out that portugal is a neutral country. if a warring party's aircraft enters the country, the pilot will be detained immediately until the end of the war.

lieutenant ilfrey did not leave the cockpit, but kept nagging the portuguese and deceived the ground crew to cheer for his p-38f. at this time, a portuguese major climbed up to the cockpit and asked to inspect the p-38f.

the cunning second lieutenant ilfrey guessed that the officer had never seen a p-38 and was very curious. so he talked to the portuguese major and explained how to control the p-38f while quickly thinking about how to escape.

after a while, the ground crewman had already refueled the engine. seeing that the time had come, second lieutenant ilfrey lied and pretended to show how to start the engine. then, while the portuguese personnel were not paying attention, he suddenly pushed the accelerator to accelerate.

the portuguese major standing on the wing was caught off guard and was thrown off the plane and fell heavily to the ground, cursing all the time. lieutenant ilfrey didn't care about all that, he accelerated and took off, fled portugal, and finally landed in gibraltar.

▲second lieutenant ilfrey’s p-38 was undergoing maintenance on the north african battlefield in december 1942.

this incident caused a bad international impact. portugal expressed serious protests to the united states and even demanded that the perpetrators be tried. everyone from the group commander to the squadron commander came to criticize second lieutenant ilfrey. in the end, it was the commander of the 12th air force, doolittle, who came forward to settle the matter.

in the north african battlefield, second lieutenant ilfrey completed 72 combat missions, flying for 208 hours, and achieved 5.5 combat results, becoming the p-38's first ace. on april 5, 1943, he was promoted to captain and transferred back to china as an instructor.

in the spring of 1944, captain ilfrey returned to the uk and was appointed commander of the 79th squadron of the 20th fighter group. his vehicle was changed to a p-38j (numbered 43-28431), nicknamed "happy jack's off-road vehicle". but captain ilfrey's next experience was anything but happy.

▲the p-38 fighter formation of the 20th fighter group in 1944.

▲captain ilfrey’s p-38 aircraft after returning to the uk.

on may 24, 1944, captain ilfrey led his team to fly over berlin to perform an escort mission. he first shot down a bf-109 cleanly, but in the subsequent battle, he was unable to dodge and collided with another bf-109.

the fragile bf-109 crashed immediately, and about 1.5 meters of the outer right wing of captain ilfrey's aircraft was knocked off. this was almost a fatal situation, but captain ilfrey did not parachute, and desperately pushed the rudder and lever to the left, while increasing the power of the right engine and reducing the power of the left engine.

after some operations, the seriously injured p-38j finally stabilized, but returning to the uk from germany was not easy. thanks to the sturdy body and huge range of the p-38j, as well as the double insurance of the two engines, captain ilfrey finally returned home safely.

▲captain ilfrey’s p-38j after being hit and returning home. note that the outer section of the right wing was knocked off, and a group of ground crewmen gathered around it.

in all kinds of thrilling accidents, captain ilfrey was always able to save the day, and two months later he was favored by the goddess of luck again. that day, after captain ilfrey attacked a railway bridge near angers, a city in western france, he spotted a train approaching in the distance, and he immediately flew towards the train.

however, the train was equipped with anti-aircraft guns. captain ilfrey's plane was hit and one of the engines caught fire. the situation was very critical. he tried to pull up the plane, but the pull cord was interrupted and nothing happened.

since it was a ground licking mission, the height was not very low. if you were to parachute, you would probably fall to the ground without opening the parachute, but if you didn't jump, there would be no chance of survival. captain ilfry jumped out without any hesitation.

as expected, due to the low height, the parachute had no time to fully deploy, but by chance, captain ilfrey accurately landed in a forest, with an open space next to it, and he was lucky enough to save his life. .

captain ilfry was quickly rescued by french locals. he received medical treatment and food, and obtained a bicycle and fake identity documents. he transformed into a deaf-mute peasant named "jacques robert" and passed through the german army. the heavy defense lines finally reached the allied front and returned to britain on june 20.

▲during the battle of normandy, two p-38s attacked a bridge at low altitude.

▲captain ilfrey, who disguised himself as a french peasant, luckily escaped the pursuit of the germans and returned to england.

after successfully returning to the uk, captain ilfrey was not sent back to the united states like most returnees, but continued to stay with the 79th squadron and changed to the p-51d-5 to continue the attack.

by early december 1944, captain ilfrey had completed 70 combat missions and 320 hours of flying time before returning to the united states after completing the war. for the remainder of the war, he was transferred to a staff post on the pacific coast, finally retiring in december 1945 with the rank of major, having achieved 7.5 results.