AIRPLANES: Japanese “Jill” – Navy torpedo plane. 1944.

BOMBING: The city of Ponape, Japanese stronghold in the Carolines before the Liberators of the 7th AF launched their incendiary attack. Slight bomb damage noticeable in the picture was caused by preliminary “feel out” raids prior to all-out attack.

BOMBING: Ponape town on 17 February 1944 before it was bombed.

BOMBING: HEADQUARTERS, SEVENTH AIR FORCE, March 12, 1944 – After half the Japanese city of Ponape had been gutted by a new type fire bomb, Consolidated B-24 Liberators of the Seventh Air Force continue a relentless pin-point bombing of remaining Japanese installations with the general purpose bombs.

BOMBING: Airdrome at Woleai, in the western Carolines, after raid of 1 April 1944 by carrier based Navy aircraft. Woleai is one of the closest islands to the Philippines

FIELDS & INSTALLATIONS: Aviation engineers rush to completion a quonset hut which will serve as a ward for a 750 bed station hospital on one of the islands in the Marianas. In the foreground, Pfc. Weslie M. Rumley, 22, Parma, Idaho (left), and a Technician Fifth Grade Elliott Ashworth, 22, Chase City, Va., fit a corrugated sheet of steel roofing in place. 1945.

AIRPLANES: A formation of Marianas Islands based Boeing B-29’s fly high above the Pacific. Capable of carrying a larger bomb load farther than any other plane in World War II, the “Superfortresses” brought the war to the Japanese homeland.

AIRPLANES: Marianas Islands – Two aviation mechanics of a 7th AAF fighter base in the Marianas who have helped build new planes from scrap parts in this aircraft graveyard look up from their work of dismantling Republic P-47 fuselages to see a flight of Thunderbolts roar overhead. One plane called “Scraps” dove at better than 700 miles an hour to attack raiding Japanese planes at this airbase. 1945.

AIRPLANES: Outbound Republic P-47 “Thunderbolts” on an island defense patrol have the right of way as they flash across the end of a runway at a strategic base in the Marianas. Red lights on stop signs at each end of a runway warn ground traffic of approaching aircraft. Here, T/5 James B. Lazar of Greenville, S.C., member of the 805th Aviation Engineer Battalion doubles as a traffic cop. October 1944.

AIRPLANES: At sunset, a Northern P-61 Black Widow night fighter awaits the arrival of the crew which will take her out on a patrol or interception mission far out over the water which surrounds her 7th AAF base in the Marianas. 1945.