Nightstalkers

The Wright Project and the 868th Bomb Squadron in World War II

Richard Phillip Lawless

• Publisher: Casemate
• Year: 2024
• eBook ISBN: 9781636242064
• Subtopic: Military & Maritime History

"Takes the reader into the Pacific war and offers a front-row seat to the exploits of the Wright Project and their highly innovative technology." — War History Network
In August 1943, a highly classified US Army Air Force unit, code-named the "Wright Project," departed Langley Field for Guadalcanal in the South Pacific to join the fight against the Empire of Japan. Operating independently, under sealed orders drafted at the highest levels of Army Air Force, the Wright Project was unique, both in terms of the war-fighting capabilities provided by classified systems the ten B-24 Liberators of this small group of airmen brought to the war, and in the success these "crash-built" technologies allowed. The Wright airmen would fly only at night, usually as lone hunters of enemy ships. In so doing they would pave the way for the United States to enter and dominate a new dimension of war in the air for generations to come.
This is their story, from humble beginnings at MIT's Radiation Lab and hunting U-boats off America's eastern shore, through to the campaigns of the war in the Pacific in their two-year march toward Tokyo. The Wright Project would prove itself to be a combat leader many times over and an outstanding technology innovator, evolving to become the 868th Bomb Squadron.
Comprehensive and highly personal, this story can now be revealed for the very first time, based on official sources, and interviews with the young men who flew into the night.
"A limber romp across the world of electronics and into the history of World War II." —ARGunners.com

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half-Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Prologue
• Author’s note
• Introduction
• Chapter 1 World War Comes to America and to “Bid” Dolan, January–May 1942
• Chapter 2 Rad Lab and Microwave Radar, 1940–43
• Chapter 3 Langley Field and the 1st Sea-Search Attack Group, June–December 1942
• Chapter 4 Low Altitude Bombing, January–July 1943
• Chapter 5 The Wright Project, July–August 1943
• Chapter 6 Guadalcanal, August–September 1943
• Chapter 7 Battles in The Slot, October–December 1943
• Chapter 8 Munda and Rabaul, December 1943–March 1944
• Chapter 9 Mighty Truk, Deadly Truk, March–June 1944
• Chapter 10 Vince Splane and Devil’s Delight, September 1943–March 1944
• Chapter 11 Munda to Momote, April–June 1944
• Chapter 12 The Art DeLand Crew and 396, April–June 1944
• Chapter 13 Radar Reflections, 1943–44
• Chapter 14 Ever Forward Toward Tokyo, July–September 1944
• Chapter 15 Balikpapan and Makassar Strait, October 1944
• Chapter 16 The Philippines, November–December 1944
• Chapter 17 Captain Earle Smith and Lieutenant Ron Moyer, August 1944
• Chapter 18 Tough Times, January–February 1945
• Chapter 19 Turnaround and Baylis Harriss, March 1945
• Chapter 20 Morotai Missions, April 1945
• Chapter 21 Bob Thompson and Crew, November 1944–June 1945
• Chapter 22 Strangling the Empire, Morotai Operations, May–June 1945
• Chapter 23 Morotai to Okinawa via Leyte, July 1945
• Chapter 24 Okinawa and Japan, August 1945
• Chapter 25 Coming Home, September–October 1945
• Chapter 26 The “Other Snoopers”: The Scott and Hopson SB-24 Projects,1943–45
• Epilogue 1945–80
• Appendix A
• Appendix B
• Appendix C
• Appendix D
• Appendix E
• Appendix F
• Appendix G
• Appendix H
• Appendix I
• Appendix J
• Appendix K
• Appendix L
• A Liberator Bibliography
• A General Bibliography
• Endnotes