Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/509th Composite Group

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The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

509th Composite Group[edit]

Nominator(s): Hawkeye7 (talk) and Reedmalloy (talk)


A very famous military formation, one which is still active today. But this article is about it during World War II. Hawkeye7 (talk) 03:30, 26 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments It's good to see this important article in excellent shape - are you planning on taking this to FAC? (I hope so).

  • Yes, I intend to take it to FAC. It will be a co-nom with User:Reedmalloy, who wrote most of the article. I intended to send about a dozen Manhattan Project articles to FAC over the next year. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:41, 28 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have the following comments:

  • The lead seems a bit short - I'd suggest fleshing this out so it provides a more comprehensive summary of the article
  • Was there anything special about the original crews of the 393d Bombardment Squadron which remained with this group? (eg, were they merely the best 15 of the 21 trainee crews who happened to be assigned to this unit, or had they been hand picked from a larger pool before being whittled down further?)
    • I deleted this because it was not covered by the source. All I really know is that a B-29 squadron had 15 crews. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:41, 28 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • The criteria for selecting the final 15 crews is not known to me, but this squadron was put together routinely for the 504th Group (unlike the movie version) and sent en masse to Wendover. The "pool" from which the final 15 were selected were the 21 crews originally assigned by the AAF for the 504th. Having said all this, I don't have any documentation to back it up yet.--Reedmalloy (talk) 22:58, 28 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • OK, that seems likely Nick-D (talk) 09:45, 29 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
          • I found a source for the reduction in the number of crews, but it says 20 crews instead of 21. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:42, 5 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • The "216th AAFBU" should be spelt out when it first appears
  • "Project W-47 (superseded by Project Alberta)" - what this involved should be briefly spelt out in the article
  • I'd suggest swapping the order of the first two paras in the 'Overseas movement' section: the anecdotes about security need some lead-in
  • I vaguely remember reading somewhere that Tibbets initially prepared the group to operate against targets in Germany or Japan - is this correct?, and if so can something be added to the article on it?
    • I cannot find it. Tibbets says that in September 1944 he expected to go to the Pacific, because this was where the B-29s were deployed. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:41, 28 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • To the best of my knowledge, after assignment to what became the 509th, the group trained solely for the atomic mission.--Reedmalloy (talk) 22:58, 28 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • OK, my memory must be faulty (and it makes sense given that in September 1944 the Allies thought that the war in Europe would be over within weeks). Nick-D (talk) 09:45, 29 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'd suggest noting that the early combat missions over Japan were flown in small formations to convince the Japanese that such forces were not unusual and posed little threat, and so weren't worth trying to intercept. Nick-D (talk) 08:26, 28 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
    • Do we have a source for that? The only one I have is Coster-Mullins. I did add the bit about flying above the effective range of the flak. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:41, 28 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • I've just added some material on this. Norman Polmar's short book The Enola Gay: The B-29 That Dropped the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima is excellent if you can find a copy. Nick-D (talk) 09:45, 29 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • Yes, I have a copy here. Thanks for that. Hawkeye7 (talk) 12:33, 29 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support My comments are now addressed - again, great work with this article. Nick-D (talk) 09:45, 29 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • "Because was self-sustained": ?
    • Correct, but perhaps confusing to the non-military reader. Re-worded. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:50, 9 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The 390th Air Service Group was created as the command echelon for the 603rd Air Engineering Squadron, the 1027th Air Material squadron, and its own Air Base Support Squadron, but as these units became independent operationally, acted as the basic support unit for the entire 509th Composite Group": "as" could have two or three different meanings here, and I'd prefer an "it" before "acted".
  • "27 sorties": write out (or move) numerals at the start of sentences.
  • "the other ... had its bomb ... plunge through the closed bomb bay doors": I wouldn't say that my car had its muffler fall off; the car isn't the actor.
    • Re-worded. Can you imagine how some of these incidents might have played out with a live atomic bomb? Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:50, 9 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Four targets were designated": This and following (until the next bullet) aren't thematically or grammatically part of the list.
    • Tweaked to trim the military jargon, which should make it clearer. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:50, 9 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • "the disassembled components of the first two atomic bombs were transshipped to Tinian": not what "transshipped" (transitive) means (but it's close), per M-W. That seems like a reasonable meaning to take hold some day, but it's easier to defend my work if I can point to something in the dictionaries.
  • "a nine washer-like rings": nine washer-like rings
  • "The first four were expended in test drops; the fifth test was the rehearsal on Iwo Jima; and L-11 provided the bomb shell for the Hiroshima bomb.": commas
  • "2:45 a.m. 7.5 tonnes": insert a comma
  • "Special Mission 16 was moved up two days from 11 August because of adverse weather forecasts, with the added benefit of suggesting to the Japanese that the United States was not limited in its supply of bombs.": How does moving the date two days forward suggest that?
    • I think what was meant is that a bombing pause might have given the Japanese the impression that there was only one bomb. Removed this phrase. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:50, 9 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • "using radar. However the Fat Man was dropped visually": "using radar; however, Fat Man was dropped visually", or "using radar, but Fat Man was dropped visually"
    • Move than one source has expressed suspicion. Hawkeye7 (talk) 22:50, 9 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • "However the pit for the third bomb was still at Site Y on 13 August when Groves ordered that all shipments of material be stopped. His order reached Los Alamos in time to keep the pit from being shipped." [Assuming you want to keep "however":] "However, Groves ordered that all shipments of material be stopped while the pit for the third bomb was still at Site Y on 13 August." (I think the readers will assume that this stopped the shipment unless you tell them otherwise.)
  • "After the announcement of the Japanese surrender, however": As you know, reviewers sometimes give "however" a hard time at FAC. I don't support a blanket condemnation of "however" ... but if you use it 4 times in a short span (including the footnote), then it necessarily loses the useful meaning of "pay special attention here, because this reverses what you'd assume from what I just said". That is, emphatic words lose their ability to draw special attention when they're overused.
  • "140 sorties ... 60 flights": sentences beginning with numerals
  • "Four of the eight were delivered in August as spares for the 509th, two others were sent to Wright Field in August for modifications, then detached to the 216th Base Unit in October as test aircraft, and the final two ...": nonparallel. "... modifications and detached ..."
  • "Barry Nelsonas" Barry Nelson as
  • Support on prose per new standard disclaimer. - Dank (push to talk) 18:47, 9 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support Image review and general comments

  • :File:Agnew HiroshimaAircraft.jpg is a problem because Harold Andrews' status needs to be clarified. If he was an official photographer then the license is appropriate. If not, and I strongly suspect not, then the photograph needs a different license, which will likely preclude its use here.
    • Here's the situation as I understand it. Harold Agnew was a civilian working on the Manhattan Project as part of Project Alberta. He was technically employed under a government contract with the University of California. On Tinian, civilian Project Alberta personnel wore plain uniforms without rank badges. The camera was government owned, a special one for taking colour pictures of the operation for the Manhattan Project. It was used for taking shots of the Nagasaki raid. It seems that he took the photographs back with him. The one we have seems to have come from the Agnew collection by a roundabout route. Of course, we could just try asking him. Hawkeye7 (talk) 03:42, 2 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
      • If you know how to do so, then go ahead and do it. If he used a government camera and his duties included photography, then the license seems appropriate, but I'm sure that the question will come up again at FAC.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 04:16, 2 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
        • He took the movie footage on the Hiroshima mission. Hawkeye7 (talk) 12:35, 2 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Is this correct?: L-1, L-2, L-5 and L-6 were expended in test drops. L-6 was used in the Iwo Jima dress rehearsal What was used for the 31 July rehearsal?
  • If it took nine rings to make up the hollow cylinder, and four rings were delivered by C-54s then where did the other five rings come from?
    • Corrected. There were three C-54s, each with three rings. The other two were on the plutonium mission, which accounts for all five. Hawkeye7 (talk) 12:35, 2 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • The B-29s covered almost 400 miles within 45 minutes? I know the B-29 was fast, but that's nearly 600 mph! If that's what the source says, OK, but somebody needed to check their distance better.
    • Corrected. Re-checked the source and it says 90 minutes. Which makes it 300 mph. Which sounds plausible. Hawkeye7 (talk) 12:35, 2 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 00:39, 2 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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