Truman Subcommittee Report On Aircraft - July, 1943

Sat Dec 31, 2016 9:36 pm

For you students of WWII aircraft history, you may like this Senate report from July of 1943. It talks about the different aircraft and their uses. It goes into detail about the investigation into the problems (substandard engines, cover-ups, etc) at the Curtiss-Wright plant in Lockland, OH. The engine may have been the R-2600? It also talks about early helo development and rips the Navy apart for intentionally failing to explore helicopter use.

http://www.aviation-history.com/engines/Truman_Committee_SRes71.pdf

Sat Dec 31, 2016 10:18 pm

If someone could write a book about WWII aircraft procurement problems without having a political axe to grind (unlike the biased "Barons of the Sky"), it would be well worth reading for those who think all of WWII was "Rosie the Rivetter" and war bonds/PR stuff.

I'd like to too earn more favourite fall of CW and how Martin fell from grace with the USAAC/USAAF/USAF.

The commentator the Navy and helicopters is interesting, since later on the war the Navy sponsored a fair bit of helicopter research, primarily for possible ASW applications (which wouldn't become practical until the capable HSS-1 (H-34/S-58) became available.

Sat Dec 31, 2016 11:13 pm

Second JohnB...

Barons of the Sky was decidedly antiwar (you guess who that might be) perspective.

The Truman reports tell you just what the left was up to during the war, and they are not ashamed of it.

Sat Dec 31, 2016 11:30 pm

This may help explain the environment during the WWII time frame with govt/defense contractors. My reading of this leads me to believe it was a three-fold purpose. One of course was rooting out the fraud, waste and abuse in govt contracts during the war. The others were political in nature dealing with protecting FDR's lack of oversight and excessive spending and greasing the skids for Truman as the next President. I Googled around for Martin aircraft issues involved with the Truman Committee. I seen the frequent B-26 crashes mentioned a few times.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truman_Committee

I read this about the R-2600's built at that Curtiss-Wright plant. That is where I got the idea this was the engine the subcommittee report was talking about. Someone else may know more about this and if any other aircraft engine types were involved??

http://www.enginehistory.org/Wright/R-2600/R-2600Lockland.shtml

Yes, the Navy's decision not to embrace helo's early on was surprising. I knew the AAF and USCG were deeply interested in the use of helos....the CG more for SAR than ASW and I believe the AAF for field medivacs of the wounded.

We were having an offline discussion about the CG's three Curtiss SOC-4's (V171, V172, V173). One of our CG aircraft historians mentioned he located in his research that after the Truman Committee's work, future VP and Prez Truman made sure Curtiss did not get anymore govt aircraft contracts, which was their demise for aircraft production. He also mentioned the govt/AAF told them to start producing P-51's and they refused and kept producing the P-40. There may be more to the story but that was what he was recalling.

Tue Jan 03, 2017 1:55 am