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Kittyhawk!

March 27 2006 at 9:26 PM
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Carl-Fredrik Geust 
from IP address 80.186.175.54


Response to Warhawk or Kittyhawk

 

One (the most important?) reason for using the name Kittyhawk (and consequently the KH-51) for the captured P-40M in Finnish AF was apparently that all P-40s from version "E" onwards were generically - rightly or wrongly - called "Kittyhawk" in the Soviet Air Force, while the P-40B and P-40C versions were similarly called "Tomahawk".

As these names were well-known to the Finnish radio intelligence, the captured aircraft was naturally assumed to be a "Kittyhawk"! Only when the exact relation between the USAAF serial number and the version became known in the 1960-1970s it became clear that the aircraft was in fact not a RAF "Kittyhawk"!
Carl

 
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