Operation Halyard
Operation Halyard, known in Serbian as Operation Air Bridge, was an Allied airlift operation behind Axis lines during World War II. In July 1944, the Office of Strategic Services drew up plans to send a team to the Chetniks force led by General Draža Mihailović in the German-occupied Territory of the Military Commander in Serbia for the purpose of evacuating Allied airmen shot down over that area. This team, known as the Halyard team, was commanded by Lieutenant George Musulin, along with Master Sergeant Michael Rajacich, and Specialist Arthur Jibilian, the radio operator. The team was detailed to the United States Fifteenth Air Force and designated as the 1st Air Crew Rescue Unit. It was the largest rescue operation of American airmen in history.
According to historian Professor Jozo Tomasevich, a report submitted to the OSS showed that 417 Allied airmen who had been downed over occupied Yugoslavia were rescued by Mihailović's Chetniks, and airlifted out by the Fifteenth Air Force. According to Lieutenant Commander Richard M. Kelly, a grand total of 432 U.S. and 80 Allied personnel were airlifted during the Halyard Mission. According to Robert Donia, allied air operations over Partisan territory in Yugoslavia were strategically significant and extensive in scope. Evaders’ forms show that airmen landed on much of Yugoslavia from eastern Serbia to Slovenia and even on Bulgaria. Evacuees most frequently mentioned airstrips at Tičevo, Sanski Most and on the Croatian coastal island of Vis. Of the 2,364 flyers rescued from Yugoslavia, about 2,000 were extracted from Partisan-controlled territory and 350 from Chetnik-controlled territory.
Background
Targets for bombing
After the successful Allied invasion of Sicily, Italy capitulated in the autumn of 1943, and the Allies occupied the whole of southern Italy. In late 1943, the 15th Air Force of the United States Army Air Forces, under the command of General Nathan Twining, was transferred from Tunisia to an airfield near Foggia. This airfield became the largest American air base in southern Italy, and was used for attacking targets in southern and eastern Europe. The 15th Army Air Force also used the nearby airfields of Bari, Brindisi, Lecce and Manduria.The 15th Air Force bombed targets in Germany, Hungary, Slovakia, the Independent State of Croatia, the Territory of the Military Commander in Serbia, Bulgaria and Romania. Some of the most important targets were sources of petroleum and petroleum refineries in Romania. These installations were vital to Hitler's war machine and the main targets in the Oil Campaign of World War II. The Astra Română refinery in Ploiești alone provided one quarter of the Third Reich's fuel needs and was one of the priority targets. All flights targeting the oilfields and refineries in Romania, near the town of Ploiești north of Bucharest, passed over the Territory of the Military Commander in Serbia.
Flight path
From October 1943 to October 1944, the 15th Air Force conducted about 20,000 sorties with fighters and bombers. During this time, it lost almost fifty percent of its aircraft but only about ten percent of its personnel. It had at its disposal 500 heavy bombers and about 100 fighter escorts.The flight path from southern Italy to the targets in Romania was repeatedly used every day from the spring of 1944. Two-thirds of these flights were carried out against objectives in Bulgaria, Romania and the German-occupied zone of Serbia. The Germans had at their disposal a limited number of fighter aircraft whose most frequent targets were Allied planes that had already been damaged by Axis anti-aircraft defenses in Bulgaria and Romania, planes that because of such damage had to fly slowly at low altitude.
In the spring of 1944, the 15th Air Force intensified the bombing of targets in Bulgaria and Romania, resulting in American aviators being forced to bail out of damaged aircraft over Yugoslavia in increasing numbers. Some crews fell into the hands of Romanian, Bulgarian, Croatian or German troops and were sent to prisoner of war camps. By August 1944, 350 bombers had been lost. Many of the crews survived: some came down in territory held by Marshal Tito's Partisans, while others found refuge in Serbia with Draža Mihailović`s Chetniks.
The first American airmen bailed out over the German-occupied zone of Serbia on 24 January 1944. That day two Liberators were shot down, one of them over Zlatibor, the other over Toplica. One bomber, damaged by German fighter planes, made an emergency landing between Pločnik and Beloljin. A crew of nine were rescued by the Chetnik Toplica Corps under the command of Major Milan Stojanović. The crew were placed in the home of local Chetnik leaders in the village of Velika Draguša. Another bomber was shot down that same day, the crew bailing out over Mount Zlatibor. They were found by members of the Zlatibor Corps. A radiogram message about the rescue of one of the crews was sent by Stojanović to Mihailović on 25 January. Major Stojanović wrote that the previous day about 100 bombers flew from the direction of Niš towards Kosovska Mitrovica, and that they were followed by nine German fighter aircraft. After a half-hour battle, one plane caught fire and was forced to land between the villages of Pločnik and Beloljin, in the Toplica River valley.
By early July 1944, over one hundred airmen were in areas under Chetnik control. The German and Bulgarian occupation forces in Serbia that had spotted the damaged aircraft and open parachutes pursued the airmen. However, Chetniks under Mihailović had already reached them. The Germans offered cash for the capture of Allied airmen. However, peasants accepted the airmen into their homes and fed them for months without Allied help. Hospitals for sick and wounded airmen were established in Pranjani village.
Creation of the Air Crew Rescue Unit
officers already had secured Marshal Tito's cooperation in retrieving downed airmen. In January 1944 Major Linn M. Farish and Lieutenant Eli Popovich had parachuted into Partisan HQ at Drvar to arrange assistance in rescuing American flyers. Following a meeting with Tito on 23 January 1944, orders went out to all Partisan units to do everything possible to locate downed airmen and conduct them safely to the nearest Allied liaison team.Efforts to retrieve aircrews from Chetnik-controlled areas ran afoul of the tangled web of Balkan politics. The British, who considered that part of the world within their sphere of interest, had shifted their support to Tito and were determined to sever all ties with Mihailović lest they offend the Communist leader. American attempts to maintain contact with Mihailović had been rebuffed by London. Nonetheless, General Nathan F. Twining, commander of the 15th Air Force, was determined to rescue his downed airmen. On 24 July 1944, thanks to the efforts of Twining and several OSS officers, General Ira C. Eaker directed the 15th Air Force to establish an Air Crew Rescue Unit. This independent organization of the Mediterranean Allied Air Forces, attached to the 15th Air Force, would be responsible for locating and evacuating Allied airmen throughout the Balkans.
Selected to head the ACRU was Colonel of the AAF Transport Command. Kraigher had flown for the Royal Serbian Air Force in World War I. Prior to World War II, Kraigher had played a key role in developing a Pan American Airways air route from Miami to the Middle East via Brazil and West Africa. Taking over the rescue unit, Kraigher formed two parties. One would work with Tito's Partisans, the other with Mihailović's Chetniks.
Lieutenant George Musulin, an OSS officer who had led a liaison mission to Mihailović and one of the foremost advocates of maintaining contact with the Chetniks, was named commander of ACRU 1. Musulin, as Lieutenant Nelson Deranian, chief of OSS Special Operations Branch Bari suggested, possessed "the rugged character required to meet the hardships involved". Master Sergeant Michael Rajacich, borrowed from OSS Secret Intelligence Branch for this particular assignment, and Navy Specialist 1st Class Arthur Jibilian, the mission's OSS radio operator, rounded out Musulin's team.
Rescue of American airmen
On the night of 2–3 August 1944, after several abortive attempts, the Halyard Mission team parachuted into Mihailović's headquarters at Pranjani.Airman Richard Felman, who was at Pranjani, recalls the scene when the mission arrived at the airfield:
The one who was in the lead was a mob of Chetniks—they were kissing him and cheering him with tears in their eyes. He was in an American uniform and was one of the biggest chaps I'd ever seen. He walked over to us and put out his hands. 'I'm George Musulin', he said.
Musulin arranged a meeting with a committee of the airmen to discuss the preparations that would need to be made before evacuation could take place. He discovered that there were approximately 250 airmen divided into six groups and housed within a ten-mile radius of the airstrip at Galovića polje near Pranjani. Musulin established a courier service between the mission and the various groups in order to provide daily news on the progress being made. He also distributed funds to enable the airmen to purchase needed supplies. At the same time, Mihailović assigned the First Ravna Gora Corps to provide security for the operation.
According to Professor Kirk Ford, the airmen assembled at Pranjani awaiting evacuation represented a potential source of intelligence, particularly concerning Serbia:
They had witnessed the civil war between Chetnik and Partisan forces and had experienced the full range of Chetnik-German relations, from open hostility to wary tolerance and at times accommodation. They had seen Chetnik soldiers give their lives to save them from capture and had been protected and well-treated by Mihailović's forces and by the Serbian peasantry. Their very presence at Pranjani under Chetnik was itself a clear evidence that Mihailović remained a well-disposed toward the United States and was no collaborator in the true sense of the word.
According to statistics compiled by the US Air Force Air Crew Rescue Unit, between 1 January and 15 October 1944, a total of 1,152 American airmen were airlifted from Yugoslavia, 795 with the assistance of the Yugoslav Partisans and 356 with the help of the Serbian Chetniks. Serbian-American Lieutenant Eli Popovich, part of the Halyard Mission attached to Partisan HQ, kept in radio contact with Arthur Jibilian to co-ordinate the rescue of all American and foreign airmen in Yugoslavia from Mihailović's HQ.