^^^^ President Roosevelt directed that the Presidential Unit Citation be awarded to the India-China Wing in recognition of their service. Hardin was given a month's leave in the United States, promoted to
brigadier general, and as the representative of the wing received the award from General Arnold on 29 January 1944, the first awarded to a non-combat unit.
[7][8] Hardin returned to the India China Wing in February 1944, just as the first of a trickle of four-engined
Douglas C-54 Skymaster transports arrived in theater (
see Operations on the low hump and in China below). With a maximum load ceiling of only 12,000 feet the C-54s were unable to hurdle the high Hump. Japanese interceptors blocked use of eastbound routes at lower altitudes and the C-54s were limited for the time being to freight movement within India or flights between the CBI and the continental United States.
Hardin advanced to command of the ICW on 21 March 1944 when Hoag was transferred to head ATC's European Wing.
[88][ag] A month later, to give Hardin closer personal contact with his growing number of airbases,
[89] ICW changed its headquarters from New Delhi to
Rishra, north of Calcutta. There, on the 40-acre (160,000 m2) site of the Hastings Jute Mill, Stratemeyer, now a lieutenant general and commander of all USAAF forces in the CBI, established Hastings Army Air Base as the headquarters of the Army Air Forces India-Burma Theater, using a converted 8.5-acre (34,000 m2) mill building to house his headquarters, that of CBI Air Service Command, and ICWATC.
[90][91][92] Under Hardin, tonnages increased, but so did expectations and frustrations; morale and safety concerns continued to plague the operation.
[3] In the first 54 days of 1944, 47 transports were lost.
[93] One transport was being lost for every 218 flights, an accident rate of 1.968 planes lost per thousand hours, of one life for every 162 trips flown or 340 tons delivered.
[94][95]
In June 1944, after the capture of the Japanese fighter base at Myitkyina and at the behest of Brig. Gen.
William H. Tunner, Col. Andrew B. Cannon was assigned to command the Assam Wing when it was activated the next month. Tunner, who was to become airlift commander following Hardin, anticipated that the end of the fighter threat would see a massive influx of C-54s into the India-China operation. Like Haynes, Alexander, and Tunner, Cannon had been a pioneer in the Air Transport Command, where as a protege of Tunner's he was base commander of
Long Beach Army Air Field, where Tunner made his headquarters as commander of ATC's Ferry Division, and commanding officer of the 6th Ferrying Group.
[96] On 1 July, ATC reorganized its nine wings worldwide into air divisions, and sectors into wings. The ICW-ATC became the
India China Division ATC (ICD-ATC), while the Eastern Sector, carrying out the India-China airlift, was re-designated the
Assam Wing, and the Western Sector support organization became the
India Wing. The India China Division also had an operational training unit at
Gaya[97] and used the service depots of the China-Burma-India Air Service Command at
Panagarh, Agra, and
Bangalore.
[98]
Systems for identifying units and organizations assigned to the airlift changed several times between 1942 and 1945. The final change occurred on 1 August 1944 when the Air Transport Command discontinued the use of station numbers to identify its units and designated them as numbered "
USAAF Base Units" with parenthetical modifiers describing their function. USAAF base units collectively identified all permanent party organizations, including flying units, at any particular non-combat base. The flying units were commonly denoted as lettered squadrons, i.e. "Squadron B", within the Base Unit.
[92] To illustrate the various organizational changes affecting the India-China airlift, the unit at Chabua under 10AF deployed overseas as the
1st Ferrying Group. It was redesignated the
1st Transport Group on 1 December 1942 to denote that it was an ATC unit. Next it became
Station No. 6 (APO 629 New York) on 1 December 1943 when for flexibility ATC no longer fielded groups or squadrons as units. Finally it became the
1333rd USAAF Base Unit (Foreign Transport Station) on 1 August 1944 in conformance with USAAF policy service-wide. Similarly,
Headquarters Squadron, Eastern Sector, India-China Wing, established at Chabua on 16 September 1943 to administer the headquarters of the airlift, was redesignated the
Headquarters Squadron, Assam Wing on 1 July 1944 when ATC reorganized itself into "divisions" and "wings"; and
Squadron A, 1325th USAAF Base Unit (HQ Assam Wing) on 1 August 1944.
[92][99]