History
Wujiaba is among the oldest airports in China, with a history that can be traced back over 100 years to the early 20th century, when Wujiaba Airport was first built under the supervision of local warlord, General Tang Jiyao.
During the Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945), which began before World War II, the airport was expanded. It was a base for operations of the legendary "Flying Tigers", the 1st American Volunteer Group (AVG), of the Chinese Air Force, led by Claire Lee Chennault before the United States entered the war. After the US entered the war in December 1941, and starting in 1942, Wujiaba Airport was the headquarters of numerous United States Army Air Forces units, including the Fourteenth Air Force and later the Tenth Air Force.
The USAAF Air Transport Command (ATC) established a major air transport facility at the airport, which connected flights west to Chabua Airfield, India, with other routes within China Jiangbei Airport (Chunking); Chenstu Air Base, and Banmaw Airport (Bhamo, Burma). After the war ended in 1945, a 1,390 mile (2,224 kilometer) route east to Clark Air Base in the Philippines was established. The route to Clark AB established a complete worldwide transport route for ATC
The Flying Tigers Association visited in October 1982 and again in September 2005. and took photos.
Read more about this topic: Kunming Wujiaba International Airport
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The awareness that health is dependent upon habits that we control makes us the first generation in history that to a large extent determines its own destiny.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“Look through the whole history of countries professing the Romish religion, and you will uniformly find the leaven of this besetting and accursed principle of action—that the end will sanction any means.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)
“The myth of independence from the mother is abandoned in mid- life as women learn new routes around the mother—both the mother without and the mother within. A mid-life daughter may reengage with a mother or put new controls on care and set limits to love. But whatever she does, her child’s history is never finished.”
—Terri Apter (20th century)