Gerard M. Devlin

Silent Wings: The Saga of the U.S. Army and Marine Combat Glider Pilots During World War II pg 140/141

During their earlier excursion into Burma, Wingate’s Chindits had used mules to carry ammunition and supplies. All of the pack animals taken in on that first mission had been requisitioned from Indian army artillery units. For the upcoming operations, larger and stronger mules had been imported from Argentina, South Africa and the United States. The newly arrived mules, averaging some 700 pounds in weight, had had their larynex surgically removed so that they would be unable to give away their position while behind Japanese lines. At General Wingate’s request, a CG-4A glider was rigged to carry three mules on a test flight. British soldiers built three padded stalls in the test glider and then, to everyone’s surprise, were ab le to lead the animals aboard without a struggle. The glider pilot brought along a mechanic armed with an M-1 rifle. Just before take-off he instructed the mechanic: ‘If any one of those critters starts raising hell up in the sky you shoot him right between the eyes before he kicks our glider apart.’

The mules proved to be docile passengers throughout the flight, and that is the way the mules were eventually flown into combat in Burma: three at a time and with a soldier prepared to shoot them if they became violent. Records show that very few mules had to be shot. Their worst tendency was one of urinating and defecating profusely during unusually turbulent flights - hardly a capital offense.

As a sidenote: Operation Thursday ran for six days and six nights. During that time, 9,052 troops, 175 horses, 1,283 mules, and half a million pounds of supplies were flown in by Troop Carrier Command, the RAF, and the 5318th (renamed the 1st Air Commando Group by General Henry H. "Hap" Arnold). ... The gliders made 74 mission in all.