I 29.2:R 92 PIPELINE TO RUSSIA THE ALAS KA-SIBERIA AIR ROUTE IN WORLD WAR II Edited by Alexander B. Dolitsky ykrasnoya^ V^irensK 3WoK^ns'< Yakutsk L I i ( ak°r V ovrr'^ \C Vsey^cha0 idan^Ny.Orr'O^0 YlarW>v0 Fairbanks Batson take ortHe\son >!L F ^"\port st Jc Dutch Great Falls ft -r. The National Park Service preserves unimpaired the natural and cultural resources and values of the National Park System for the enjoyment, education, and inspiration of this andfuture generations. Pipeline to Russia The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in World War II Whereas the Governments of the United States ofAmerica and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics declare that they are engaged in a cooperative undertaking, together with every other nation or people of like mind, to the end of laying the bases of a just and enduring world peace, securing order under law to themselves and all nations. — Washington, D.C., June 11, 1942 Edited by Alexander B. Dolitsky Published by r FLARE I Alaska Affiliated Areas Program National Park Service Anchorage, Alaska 2016 Pipeline to Russia <xx><x>o<>o<c>o<x><><>c<><x><>c><><x><c>c<>o<><x><x><x>^^ Alaska Affiliated Areas Program, NPS, Anchorage, Alaska 2016 All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, e-mail, or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher and the copyright holders. First Edition Front Cover: Soviet and American pilots near a P-63 KingCobra in Nome, 1944, with the background of the Alaska-Siberia Air Route map. Back Cover: The war poster: "Do the job he left behind.” The University ofMinnesota Libraries, Manuscripts Division. The photo: P-39 and P-63 assembly line at the Bell Aircraft Company in Buffalo, N.Y., 1944. Courtesy of the Niagara Aerospace Museum Collection, Niagara Falls, N.Y. The drawing: "Pipe Line to Russia," Bellringer magazine, a publication of the Bell Aircraft Company in Buffalo, N.Y. October, 1944. Courtesy of the Niagara Aerospace Museum collection, Niagara Falls, N.Y. Printed and bound by Las Vegas Color Graphics, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA. General Editor and Production Manager: Alexander B. Dolitsky, Alaska-Siberia Research Center Translator: James F. Gebhardt Copy Editors: James F. Gebhardt; Liz Dodd, IDTC Consultants/ Historians: James F. Gebhardt; Ivan E. Negenblya; John Cloe; Dan Hagedorn Cartographer: Brad Slama, Slama Design, Inc. Book designer: Matt Knutson, InterDesign Cover designers: Alexander B. Dolitsky, AKSRC and Andy Romanoff of Alaska Litho, Juneau, Alaska Paperback edition: ISBN-10: 0-9907252-1-3; ISBN-13: 978-0-9907252-1-3 Keywords: Alaska, ALSIB Air Route, World War II, Glazkov Memoirs, Henry V. Poor, Lend-Lease, Siberia. The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources. n THE STRUCTURE OF WORLD PEACE CANNOT BE THE WORK OF ONE MAN, ORONEPARTY, OR ONE NATION... ITMUST BE A PEACE WHICH RESTS ON THE COOPERATIVE EFFORT OF THE WHOLE WORLD. — Franklin Delano Roosevelt, March 1, 1945 Address to Congress on the Yalta Conference /*' IS documents od department <0 A S.'S' . rRrj ALASK SIBERI WW1I US Army Air Force Women Airforce Service Pilots US Army Air Force Air Transport Command WASP 7th Ferrying Squadron iii The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in World War II <xxxxxx><xxxxxxxxx><xx><xx><xxxxx><xx>o<xx><x><xx><>o<xxxx><x><>c><><xxxxxx><><xxxxxx><x><xx><xxxxx><x><>o<><x><>^^ Table of Contents Transliteration Table vii Contributors ix Acknowledgments xiii Preface by Alexander B. Dolitsky xv Foreword by Dan Hagedorn xvii Introduction by John Haile Cloe xix Alexander B. Dolitsky 1 Combat Aircraft to Siberia: U.S. Lend-Lease Aid to the Soviet Union in World War II Victor D. Glazkov 27 We Flew in the Same Sky: The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in World War II Henry Varnum Poor 87 An Artist Sees Alaska: Portraits at a Russian Base Alexander B. Dolitsky 97 One for All and All for One: Lessons of the Alaska-Siberia Air Route Selected Bibliography 101 Selected Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations Relevant to the Missions of Soviet and U.S. Armed Forces in WWII 105 Index 109 v The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in World War II <x*xx>o<>o<>o<><x><x><x>o<><><><><x><x><c>oo<><><><*>^^ Transliteration Table The system of transliteration adopted in this work is that of the United States Board of Geographic Names, with slight modifications for technical reasons. Instead of e, we use ye at the beginning of names, after vowels, and after the soft sign (b), or yo (e), where e is accented as e. The soft sign (b) and hard sign ("b) have no sound value, but they soften or harden the sound of the letter in front of them. A hard sign ("b) is transliterated when in the middle of a word and disregarded when located at the end of a word. Russian Letters Transliteration A a a (as in star, car, Arkansas) B 6 b (as in boots. Bill, Britain) B 6 V (as in voice, Virginia) r Z g (as in go, good, Michigan) A d d (as in do, road, Dakota) E e ye (as in met, yes) E e yo (as in yonder, York) >K DK zh (as in pleasure) 3 3 z (as in zoo, is, Kansas) M U i (as in meet, seat) M u y (as in may, boy) K K k (as in cat, kind, Kentucky) A Jl i (as in belt, lion, Florida) M M m (as in amuse, mother, Mexico) H H n (as in now, noose, Nebraska) O 0 o (as in port, comb, Oklahoma) n n P (as in pure, poor, Portland) P p r (as in river, trilled, Arizona) C c s (as in swim, SOS, South) T m t (as in stool, tiger, Texas) y y u (as in lunar, tune) 0 $ f (as in food, funny, California) X X kh (as in Loch Ness) u ts (as in its, quartz, waltz) H H ch (as in cheap, chain, cheese) ELI Ul sh (as in fish, sheep, shrimp) IE U{ shch (as in borsch) // L> 5 (hard sign; no equivalent) bl bl y (as in rip, flip) / b b (soft sign; no equivalent) 3 3 e (as in best, chest, effort) JO W yu (as in you, Yukon) R R ya (as in yard, yahoo) vii The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in World War II <XX><XX><X><XXXXXXXX><XXX><XX><X><XX><XxXXXXX><X><XXX>0<X>0<X><X>0<XX>C>0<X><X><><C>0<> Contributors John Haile Cloe is a retired Air Force historian who has authored numerous articles and two books. Top Cover for America: The Air Force in Alaska, 1920- 1983, and The Aleutian Warriors: A History of the 11th Air Force and Fleet Air Wing 4. Cloe has frequently appeared on the History and Discovery channels as an expert on Alaska's military past. Recently, he initiated tours to Aleutian military sites. He is the recipient of the Alaska Historical Society's Alaska Historian of the Year and Atwood Trailblazer awards and has received Air Force Historian of the Year and Excellence in Programs awards. Cloe is a retired Army Reserve colonel who served two combat tours in Vietnam as an infantry officer. He lives with his wife Susan, a retired journalist and media executive, in the Rabbit Creek area of Anchorage, Alaska. Alexander B. Dolitsky has been the president of the Alaska-Siberia Research Center in Juneau, Alaska, since 1990. Dolitsky was born and raised in Kiev in the former Soviet Union. He received an MA in history from Kiev Pedagogical Institute in 1976. In 1978, he settled in the United States where, in 1983, he earned an MA in anthropology and archaeology from Brown University. He lectured at the Russian Center at Bryn Mawr College from 1983 to 1985. After moving to Alaska in the mid-1980s, he worked as an archaeologist and social scientist for the U.S. Forest Service (1985-87), an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Russian Studies at the University of Alaska Southeast (1985-99), and Social Studies Instructor at the Alaska Department of Education (1988-2006). He has conducted 32 field studies in various areas of the former Soviet Union, Central Asia, South America, Eastern Europe, and the United States. Dolitsky was the Project Manager for the WWII Alaska-Siberia Lend-Lease Memorial erected in Fairbanks in 2006. He has published extensively in the fields of anthropology, history, archaeology, and ethnography in Current Anthropology, Arctic, American Antiquity, Sibirica, Russkiy Vek ( Century), oenno-lstoricheskiy Military- Russian V Zhurnal ( History Journal), and Ultimate Reality and Meaning. His more recent books include Allies in Wartime: The Alaska-Siberia Airway during WWII; Spirit of the Siberian Tiger: Folktales of the Russian Far East; and Living Wisdom of the Far North: Tales and Legends from Chukotka and Alaska. Victor D. Glazkov served in the Great Patriotic War, including as a radio operator on the Alaska-Siberia Air Route, from 1941 to 1945. He completed high school on the eve of the war and enlisted in the army as a volunteer. After completion of on-board radio operator courses at the Novosibirsk Civil Aviation Flight Center, he flew in the Moscow Special Mission Aviation Group MAON), which serviced all fronts. From August 1942 to September ( 1945, he served on the Alaska-Siberia Ferry Route.