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B-26B Project Farm Gate, Air Commando Squadron, VNAF insignia, South V


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There are a few pictures in Vietnam Air War Debrief.

Farm Gate looks like a standard solid nose, 8 gun Invader without turrets.

If the Revell/Monogram kit can be built without turrets, it looks like just check aerials and apply different markings .

Farm Gate aircraft suffered fatigue problems and were all grounded.

On Mark B-26 Counter Invaders were developed and introduced afterwards.

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Farm Gate in South Vietnam and Mill Pond in Laos both preceded the OnMark B-26K. The Farm Gate detachments, first known as Detachment 2A, 4400th Combat Crew Training Squadron and then as the 1st Air Commando Squadron, operated a mix of B-26B, RB-26C, and RB-26L aircraft, in addition to its T-28s, and other aircraft. I believe all the B-26Bs had the 8-gun nose and all B-26 types had the turrets removed. There were only 2 RB-26L conversions. These aircraft had initially been assigned to Mill Pond.

Edited by thatguy96
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I know I've seen a picture of at least one six gun nose B-26B in Vietnam (I think it was in the A-26 in action book), so I don't think they were all 8 gun planes. They preceded the B-26K's by a couple of years.

Edited by muswp1
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I know I've seen a picture of at least one six gun nose B-26B in Vietnam (I think it was in the A-26 in action book), so I don't think they were all 8 gun planes. They preceded the B-26K's by a couple of years.

I just checked and you are correct. There's one picture of a B-26B with a 6 gun nose in the second edition of Squadron's Invader in Action.

Oddly enough, while the B-26Ks were available from 1964 onward, issues with the older B-26Bs had already caused them to be grounded in Vietnam and replaced by A-1 Skyraider types. As a result, they would not be deployed to the region until 1966, when B-26Ks were deployed to Thailand (and redesignated A-26A, with the story being some issue with the Thai government over bombers in the country, even though this makes no sense as the US was launching B-52 strikes from Thailand at the exact same time). At the same time B-26Ks were also deployed to the Congo (where they remained B-26Ks) to help suppress the Simba Rebellion.

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