Red Burning Sky

by Tom Young

Genres: World War II; Historical Thrillers; Military Thrillers

Synopsis

From the author of Silver Wings, Iron Cross comes a suspenseful and thrilling saga based on the true story of one of World War II’s most daring and successful rescue missions.
Summer 1944: Yugoslavia is locked in a war within a war. In addition to fighting the German occupation, warring factions battle each other. Hundreds of Allied airmen have been shot down over this volatile region, among them American
lieutenant Bill Bogdonavich. Though grateful to the locals who are risking their lives to shelter and protect him from German troops, Bogdonavich dreams of the impossible: escape.
With three failed air missions behind him, Lieutenant Drew Carlton is desperate for redemption. From a Texas airbase he volunteers for a secretive and dangerous assignment, codenamed Operation Halyard, that will bring together American
special operations officers, airmen, and local guerilla fighters in Yugoslavia’s green hills. This daring plan—to evacuate hundreds of stranded airmen while avoiding detection by the Germans—faces overwhelming odds. What follows is one of the
greatest stories of World War II heroism, an elaborate rescue that required astonishing courage, sacrifice, and resilience.
Red Burning Sky is a riveting and ultimately triumphant military thriller based on true events, all the more remarkable for being so little known—until now.

Release date: February 22, 2022

Publisher: Kensington Books

Print pages: 288

Sample

Over Central Europe, June 1944

AT THE BOMBARDIER’S STATION OF MISS CAROLINE, BILL BOGDONAVICH aimed through his Norden sight and toggled the bomb release. Turbulence rocked the B-24 Liberator as heat rose from fires below. Shrapnel raked the fuselage. Bogdonavich’s target, the refineries of Ploesti, Romania, fueled the Nazi war machine, and he knew the Germans would defend them with vicious zeal. But that didn’t begin to describe the storm of explosives and sharp metal hurled up at the men and machines of the Fifteenth Air Force.

“Bombs away!” Bogdonavich called. He couldn’t judge his accuracy well. The bombs from Miss Caroline disappeared into a cauldron of smoke and fire, as if they had dropped into a burning lake.

Bogdonavich looked up from the Norden, through the aircraft’s Plexiglas nose, and saw a wide-angle vision of hell. Smoke boiled from a burning refinery, the work of bombs dropped by aircraft ahead in the formation. Both the earth and sky seemed to burn. Antiaircraft artillery rounds exploded into black puffs and slashed the air.

Up on the flight deck, the aircraft commander, Lieutenant Wilson, switched off the autopilot and racked the Liberator into a steep left bank. Now the goal was survival: escape the flak storm and turn onto the egress route over Yugoslavia. Clear the Dinaric Alps and cross the Adriatic to get back to base in southern Italy. Chalk up another mission toward completing the tour. For the crew of Miss Caroline, this was number eight. At least twenty-two more to go, assuming they managed to return to base.

Once the Liberator cleared the target area, the flak fire vanished. Bogdonavich heard Wilson ask for a damage report.

“Minimal,” Sergeant Bowers, the flight engineer, answered. “Sheet metal damage in the bomb bay. And oil pressure’s a little low in number four.”

Miss Caroline had made it through the bomb run nearly unscathed, but that didn’t mean the danger had passed. German fighters prowled egress routes, looking to exact vengeance. A bomber shot down meant a bomber that would never again threaten the Reich.

“All right, people,” Wilson called. “Use those eyeballs.”

Bogdonavich scanned the blue ahead of him. The cruciform figures of twenty B-24s dotted the sky, three of them trailing smoke. Next to Bogdonavich, Lieutenant Greenbaum, the navigator, shook his head. Bogdonavich knew what the nav was thinking: Those three stricken aircraft would probably never make it back to Italy. Bogdonavich had already counted four Liberators blown out of the sky—just the ones he’d seen. Each downed plane meant ten men dead or missing.

Below, forested hills rolled along like green ripples. In the valleys, the patchwork of fields and hedgerows offered little evidence of combat. Germans occupied most of that ground, but sheep grazed as if conflict never reached this far into Balkan farmland. Bogdonavich imagined families at their tables, blissfully ignorant of the destruction just over the horizon.

But he knew better. Yugoslavia wasn’t only at war against Nazi occupiers. Yugoslavia was at war with itself; a civil war within a world war. Bogdonavich’s father had emigrated from this land to the United States at the end of the Great War. The nation his father called the Old Country was tearing itself apart. Chetniks led by General Draza Mihailovich battled with Partisans led by Josip Broz Tito. The stories reaching Bogdonavich’s dad back in Pittsburgh were horrifying. Whenever Tito’s Communist-leaning forces took new territory, they conducted swift and public executions of anyone suspected of aiding the Chetniks. There were also reports of Chetnik massacres of Croats, Muslims, and Partisan prisoners of war.

A call from the flight engineer brought Bogdonavich back to immediate problems.

“Bandits at two o’clock high,” Bowers said.

Bogdonavich looked up and to his right. At first, he saw only the B-24s, heavy four-engine bombers lumbering toward home. But then dust motes appeared among them. The specks darted and turned. As Miss Caroline drew closer, the specks took the form of Messerschmitt Bf 109s.

Built for destroying bombers, a Bf 109 carried a pair of twenty-millimeter cannons. Bogdonavich had seen a 109 practically rip a Liberator in half. One of the 109s—there were at least eight of them—banked toward Miss Caroline. Balkenkreuz crosses marked its wings. The fighter’s guns began to flash. Bogdonavich felt hot all over.

“Here they come,” Wilson said. “Gunners, look alive.”

Bogdonavich reached for the .50-cal in the nose compartment. But when Wilson rolled the Liberator into a hard right turn, Bogdonavich lost sight of the fighter. Evidently, Bowers saw it, though. His top turret guns hammered away.

The Liberator shuddered. Bogdonavich felt the wings flex and tremble. In the same instant, the turret guns went silent. Disoriented, Bogdonavich tried to understand what was happening.

“Right wing’s on fire,” someone said on the interphone. Maybe one of the waist gunners.

“Engineer, how’s it looking?” Wilson asked.

No answer.

“Engineer, pilot,” Wilson called.

Still, no answer.

Runnels of blood, droplets pulsating with the thrum of the engines, oozed into the nose compartment. Horror gripped Bogdonavich as he realized what that meant: When the 109 raked Miss Caroline, the rounds must have torn through Sergeant Bowers in the top turret. Blood seeped through joints and crevices above the nose section. Vibration shook loose beads that spattered the navigator’s table and the bombardier’s control panel. It’s raining blood, Bogdonavich thought.

“Feather number three,” Wilson said.

The aircraft commander was ordering the copilot to shut down a flaming engine.

“The fire’s getting—” a gunner called out. He didn’t get to complete his sentence because the interphone went dead.

Miss Caroline rolled hard to the left. With communication out, Bogdonavich had no idea if Wilson was taking evasive action or if he’d just lost control. From the navigator’s table, Greenbaum looked over at Bogdonavich with eyes widened by fear. What now? By way of an answer, Bogdonavich tightened his grip on the nose gun. Nothing to do but man the weapons and defend the ship until the aircraft commander said otherwise.

The aircraft shuddered again, this time with a screech of rending metal. Miss Caroline seemed to roar in pain. Bogdonavich felt himself grow light in his seat. The aircraft was descending. Fast.

Over the cries of bending steel came the clangs of the bailout bell. Bogdonavich let go of the gun. He and Greenbaum disconnected their oxygen masks and unplugged their interphone cords. Greenbaum opened the hatch at the bottom of the nose compartment. The slipstream’s howl assaulted their ears. Far below, green hills flowed underneath the plane.

Without another word or look, Greenbaum placed a gloved hand on his rip cord and disappeared through the hatch. Bogdonavich hesitated just a moment. Every instinct screamed against leaping from an airplane. Would his chute open? Would he slam against the airframe and die from the impact?

But Bogdonavich knew what happened to crewmen who waited too long to bail. He placed his hand on the rip cord and rolled through the hatch.

The tumble through space overwhelmed his senses. Earth and sky swapped places over and over again. A rush of wind deafened him. The bright blue blinded him. When the chute inflated, the opening shock yanked Bogdonavich hard. His limbs flailed as the risers snapped tight.

The world went silent. In an instant, the engines’ reverberations vanished.

Under the canopy, Bogdonavich floated alone. He twisted in his harness to look around. He saw no other parachutes and no aircraft. He scanned the ground for a crash site, but found no telltale column of smoke. Perhaps Miss Caroline had drifted out of sight in a slow descent before striking the ground. Perhaps his crewmates all got out before him and had already touched down. For a moment, Bogdonavich felt as if he’d dropped to Earth from another planet.

He had no memory of pulling the rip cord. No matter. He had a good canopy, and now he needed to think about landing.

What had his instructors told him? Don’t brace, don’t anticipate the ground. When your boots hit, become a rag doll and roll with the impact.

Bogdonavich placed one boot over the other. Maybe that would keep a tree limb from striking his crotch. He folded his arms and placed his hands in his armpits. That served two purposes: It protected his fingers, and it shielded the arteries under his arms. He hoped his leather A-2 jacket could absorb some of the cuts and scrapes, too. He tucked his chin and closed his eyes.

And then the beating started. Something struck his shins and wrenched him to his left. Something hit him in the back. Something scratched his face. Leaves showered him.

When everything stopped moving, Bogdonavich opened his eyes. He found himself hanging in dappled shade, two feet above the forest floor. He looked up to see his parachute tangled in an oak. Pain radiated all over his body, but nothing felt broken.

He unclipped one of his releases. The effort left him swinging by his right shoulder, inches off the ground, with a strap digging into his scrotum. Bogdonavich unclipped the other release. He thudded to the dirt. His hip bone slammed into his .45 Colt. That hurt, and he stifled the urge to shout curses. He looked up through the branches at the sky, the deep blue from which he’d fallen.

For a moment, Bogdonavich’s predicament overwhelmed him. Just minutes ago, he’d flown miles above the earth at nearly two hundred miles per hour. Enemy fighters had threatened high-speed death by fire and metal. The thin, cold air of high altitude had forced him to breathe oxygen simply to remain conscious. Now he faced different dangers: on the ground, motionless and alone, in the thick, warm air of summer, in territory held by the enemy. He crept to the edge of the woods, where a pasture pitched downhill.

Three figures appeared on the slope. They trotted uphill toward Bogdonavich, accompanied by a large dog. Bogdonavich dropped his hand to his side. Unclipped his holster, gripped the pistol. But as he watched the people advance toward him, he realized they were not German soldiers. They were civilians: a woman, an old man, and a boy.

Bogdonavich wondered about their loyalties. Were they patriots or collaborators? Maybe neither. Maybe they were only hardworking farmers who just wanted to be left alone.

Over the next few minutes, Bogdonavich realized, fate would have to take its course. He couldn’t shoot civilians, and he sure as hell couldn’t read their minds. He rose to his feet. Held his arms outstretched with palms open, to look as unthreatening as possible.

The civilians hurried toward him. Bogdonavich spoke some Serbian; he’d learned the language from his dad. He’d resented it, though, and had learned only because his father insisted. To Bogdonavich, the Old Country meant old ways and old superstitions. Backwardness and poverty. Something to put behind you, not celebrate. Bogdonavich considered himself purely an American and a man of the modern age. Why should he care so much about a place he’d never even seen?

For the moment, however, he didn’t try to remember his Serbian. He simply pointed to a patch on his jacket. The patch displayed the wings of the U.S. Army Air Forces, with a 15 to designate the Fifteenth Air Force.

“American,” Bogdonavich said in English. “I’m an American.”

The dog began barking. Its teeth flashed. The animal was a fierce-looking thing of indeterminate breed. A spiked collar encircled its neck, and scars covered its nose. A farm dog for protecting livestock, Bogdonavich guessed, and wounded in battles with wolves.

The old man uttered a single syllable, and the dog hushed. The man smiled, revealing gaps in his teeth. His white beard hung to his rib cage, and he wore a traditional šajkaa atop his head—the brimless Serbian hat. He grasped Bogdonavich’s hand.

“Friend,” the man said.

Bogdonavich nodded and smiled. “Pleased to meet you,” he said.

“Friend,” the old man said. It seemed to be the only English he knew.

I could have heard worse words, Bogdonavich thought. Like “hands up” or “halt.” Or anything in German. But of all words for a non-English speaker to know, why this one? And who taught it to him?

The boy stared at Bogdonavich’s pistol. The woman avoided eye contact. She looked to be in her twenties. Fairly attractive, with a face tanned from work outside. A kerchief covered her black hair. Perhaps the old man’s daughter and grandson.

Bogdonavich searched his pockets for some small gift. In his jacket he found a pack of Beechnut gum. He handed it to the boy. The boy unwrapped the gum and tore it in half. Popped one half into his mouth and gave the other to the woman. Not the first time he’s seen gum, Bogdonavich thought. The man smiled and pointed toward the farmhouse. He gestured for Bogdonavich to follow.

They led him across the open pasture, with no effort to hide him. Apparently, they didn’t worry about Germans spotting them. Maybe they knew no Germans were around. Or maybe they were so tight with the Nazis that they were leading him into a trap.

Bergstrom Army Airfield, Texas, June 1944

LIEUTENANT DREW CARLTON SPENT THE MORNING PRACTICING takeoffs and landings with a student. After each touch-and-go, the C-47 lifted into a turbulent sky. A twenty-knot wind bounced the aircraft. The rough ride did nothing to improve Drew’s mood. Instead of bringing the fight to the Germans from a bomber base in England, where Drew had once been stationed, he was stuck on a training base in Texas. At Bergstrom Army Airfield, he taught new pilots to fly the C-47 Skytrain. The C-47 was a lumbering cargo aircraft, the military version of the DC-3. In Drew’s view, it was the least glamorous, least lethal, and least important aircraft in the United States fleet. That’s why they’d put him in it.

The weather at least presented a training opportunity. Drew talked his student through a dozen crosswind landings. He demonstrated how a pilot could maintain a straight final approach path by crabbing the aircraft into the wind. Just before touchdown, Drew pressed on a rudder pedal to kick the plane out of its crab. The plane touched down first on its right main wheel, then on its left. The white centerline stripes tracked directly under its nose.

“Very nice,” the student said. “I’ll never do it that smoothly.”

“Sure you will,” Drew said. “It just takes practice.”

Drew believed his flying proficiency was the only thing that had saved him the further disgrace of a discharge. The military kept him because he was a skilled pilot, if not a daring one. The U.S. Army Air Forces felt he could serve the war effort best as an instructor.

The other officers at Bergstrom never asked him about his brief combat tour. But he felt reproach in their eyes whenever he entered a room. Most of his fellow instructors had completed overseas tours, flying in the Pacific or North Africa. His own tour had ended in disgrace. Other men from his hometown of Columbus, Ohio, were earning Bronze Stars, Air Medals, and Purple Hearts. Their sweethearts and family members were worried and terrified, but proud. Drew’s parents had no reason for any of that. He had even considered placing the muzzle of his .45 against the roof of his mouth and letting the weapon end his pain. But a suicide would only compound his family’s humiliation. If only for that reason, he remained on duty, among the living.

During a break, he found some of the instructors in the squadron ops office, huddled around the radio. This time, no one looked at him. The news on the radio held their undivided attention.

“What’s going on?” Drew asked. He’d not bothered to turn on his Philco that morning. The last news he’d heard had come from Italy. Rome had fallen to the Allies.

“Shhh,” someone hissed. Drew got no other answer. But he recognized the voice on the radio: NBC commentator H.V. Kaltenborn. Kaltenborn’s reporting told him all he needed to know. The big invasion everyone had expected was on. The newscast described how troops had come ashore at Normandy and tanks were breaking through Hitler’s so-called Atlantic Wall. Winston Churchill had addressed the House of Commons to say everything was going according to plan.

Other broadcasts offered prayers for Allied troops, and reactions from London, Washington, DC, and Moscow. One report discussed the air operations that supported the invasion. Bombers and attack aircraft had hit German targets in France. The homely C-47 had played a critical role, too. During the night, Skytrains had dropped paratroopers to seize key roadways and cut off enemy reinforcements.

Drew would have given anything to be there, in any role. He burned for action, for a chance to redeem himself.

Only a sense of duty kept him functioning for the rest of the day. American soldiers are dying by the minute, he told himself. The least you can do is to support them from back home.

That afternoon, a strange event appeared on the instructors’ duty roster: MANDATORY BRIEFING, 1430. The roster offered no details. None of the other pilots had any idea what was up. Rumors could sweep through a squadron like fire through kerosene, but this time, no one had heard even the wildest guesses.

Thirty pilots filled the seats in the briefing room. The base commander introduced a man in civilian clothes. Colonel Overton, the commander, did not give the man’s name or title. He did not say which agency or department the man represented. Overton said only, “This gentleman flew in from Washington today, and he has some important things to say to you.”

The civilian wore a gray pinstripe suit with a matching waistcoat. His bald head shone under the lights of the briefing room. The man looked to be in his late fifties. Training posters decorated the wall behind him. One displayed silhouettes of Focke-Wulf and Messerschmitt fighters. Another showed a schematic of the C-47’s electrical system. A third declared: When you ride alone, you ride with Hitler! Join a car-sharing club today!

“Good afternoon, gentlemen,” the man began. “This briefing is classified. None of what we say here today goes outside this room. I represent an agency that reports directly to President Roosevelt. I’m here because we need volunteers. We’re looking for C-47 pilots to take on a dangerous mission.”

The man emphasized that there would be no shame in not volunteering. If a pilot did not sign up, his career would continue as planned. If a pilot did sign up, there was no guarantee of anything but high risk.

Drew sat up so straight in his chair that his shirt didn’t touch the backrest. He placed his hands on his knees and hung on every word from this mysterious civilian. Is this a chance to win back some self-respect? Drew wondered. The civilian opened the briefing to questions, but he cautioned that there were a lot of questions he couldn’t answer.

A pilot in the front row raised his hand. “Sir,” he said, “if we volunteer, where are we going?”

“Europe,” the man said. “For now, that’s as close as I can narrow it down.”

Drew raised his hand. “Sir,” he said, “can you tell us anything about the kind of flying we’ll be doing? Are we dropping troops?”

As he asked his question, he thought he saw one of his fellow instructors roll his eyes. I know what you’re thinking, Drew thought. Like yellow belly’s ever going to sign up for this.

“This is not an air assault mission,” the man answered. “All I can tell you is that the operation will likely involve short-field takeoffs and landings in German-occupied territory.”

The room fell silent as the civilian’s words sank in. Flying over enemy territory was dangerous enough. During Drew’s short stint with a bomb group, he’d seen proof of that. But this guy is asking crews to fly into a hostile area and land there, Drew thought.

“How long will this assignment last?” someone asked.

“Unknown. There is still a lot we don’t know about the location and scope of the mission.”

“Will we return to our regular units after it’s over?” another instructor asked.

“Unknown.”

The man sounded as if he’d given no thought to what the volunteers would do when they got back. Maybe he doesn’t expect the crews to get back at all, Drew considered.

“Sir,” a pilot asked, “if we volunteer, when do we need to let you know?”

“I need the names by the end of the week,” the man said. “Colonel Overton will forward a list to me. If you sign up, you can expect new orders to be cut immediately.”

Today was Tuesday. Drew had three more days to think about it.

He didn’t need three more minutes. He knew what he’d do before he even left the briefing room. The only question was whether he’d be accepted for the mission.

After an afternoon training sortie with another student, Drew went straight to Colonel Overton’s office. According to the briefing, Overton would have full discretion on which volunteers to accept for this secret mission. Drew didn’t know the commander well; he knew only that Overton was a reservist called to active duty, and that he’d been a minister before the war. Flying and preaching seemed a strange combination of skills, but Drew hoped that strange combination would work in his favor. Of all people, Drew thought, Overton should believe in redemption.

In front of the commander’s desk, Drew reported in and stood at attention. Overton said, “At ease.” Drew glanced at the diploma on the wall: Yale Divinity School, 1926. Beside the diploma hung a framed photo of a Curtiss JN-4. In younger days, Overton had flown the “Jenny” biplane.

“Sir, I’d like to volunteer,” Drew said.

“I figured that’s why you were here,” Overton said. He lifted a manila folder from his desk. “I’ve gone over your file.”

Drew felt a knot twist in his intestines. Perhaps he’d let his hopes soar too high about another chance to prove himself.

“Yes, sir,” Drew said.

“Lieutenant, why do you want to do this?”

“Sir, I’d give anything to get back in the fight.”

Overton regarded Drew without expression. Drew wondered what that blank look meant. Was it disbelief? Or, worse, pity?

“But you were in the fight.”

Drew weighed his words with care. “Sir,” he said, “I may have made some bad calls in the past. But . . . they were gray areas. I think I’ll make different decisions next time. I want to be a different kind of officer.”

Overton raised his eyebrows, pursed his lips. “Ah,” he said, “the zeal of the converted.”

Converted to what? Drew wondered. From cowardice to bra. . .