25 Mar 1944: USAAF 2Lt Anthony H Greco, was assigned to the 459th Fighter Squadron of the 80th Fighter Group, homebased at Chittagong Airfield (Google Maps link), in east India at that time. At this point, Allied and Japanese activity in northwest Burma was approaching what Wikipedia termed a “Stalemate” (offsite link): the Japanese were maneuvering to seize Imphal in India in Operation U-Go (offsite link) initiated 06 March while the Allies were countering the effort. During a flight nominally to Shwebo (Google Maps link), Burma, to intercept Japanese aircraft apparently targeting Ramu (Google Maps link), Greco’s P‑38 crashed in Chiang Dao District (Google Maps link) of Chiang Mai Province.1
Statement in a Missing Air Crew Report (MACR) 39682 recorded Greco’s disappearance by a fellow pilot:
I last saw Lt Greco about 40 miles west of Anisakan (Google Maps link) at about 1045 hours, March 25, 1944, after we had made contact with the enemy and were heading back to base.
He was flying on my wing when we were jumped from above by two Zeros. He turned a different direction in a diving evasive action with a Zero following. One Zero followed me and therefore I was unable to observe what happened. I did not see Lt Greco again after we broke away.3
Anisakan airstrip4 is located about 30 km east of Mandalay (Google Maps link). The “40 miles [75 km] west of Anisakan” actually put Greco’s point of disappearance about 25 km west of Mandalay, a far better known landmark in Burma. Per Shores (see below), if Greco’s flight did not find enemy aircraft at the destination designated as their (initial) target, Shwebo, they were to move on to Anisakan in search of the enemy. Hence the reference to Anisakan rather than Mandalay:5
A search was conducted in the area of the dogfight as recorded in this Air Map of (555) Lake Erh (click to enlarge):
However, Greco’s P-38 crash site6 (Google Maps link) was eventually found in Chiang Dao, Thailand, about 400 km southeast of Anisakan. How he ended up so far from Anisakan is unclear. One extreme: he might have been killed or incapacitated in the dogfight over Anisakan while his P-38 somehow continued airworthy to fly aimlessly without control until it ran out of fuel. Another extreme, the dogfight disabled his aircraft controls and he became an unwilling hostage in the plane, having to ride it down to ground.
In any case, Greco’s remains were apparently cared for by the Thais and, after the war, returned to the US to be buried in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific (offsite link) in Honolulu. Records indicate that his body had been recovered in Chiang Dao. And the details were subsequently forgotten.
In 2004, local news described the discovery of a crash site of a P-38 in Wiang Haeng District of Chiang Mai Province.7 Wreckage was being collected by local Thais for possible use in a historical exhibit:8
A Royal Thai Air Force (RTAF) investigation followed by two Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) investigations from Honolulu in 2005 and 2006 proved inconclusive: the individual aircraft could not be identified and no remains were found. The pieces of wreckage collected for examination were turned over to a Wiang Haeng school.9
A number on a piece of wreckage recorded during the 2005-2006 RTAF / JPAC investigations had been tied to Greco’s P-38,10 but was discounted simply because the crash site was 400 km from where the plane had last been seen and Greco’s remains had been recovered years before. In 2020, JPAC’s successor organization, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) found a record confirming that Greco’s remains had been recovered from Chiang Dao.11
It transpired that evolving Thai admin boundaries had confused latter-day investigators: when Chiang Dao District had been recorded as a crash site in 1944, the district then included Wiang Haeng as an obscure outlying subdistrict, so Chiang Dao, the containing district, was recorded as the crash site. However, by 2004, sixty years later, Wiang Haeng had itself become a district, its earlier subordinate relationship to Chiang Dao had been forgotten, and Greco’s 1944 crash site had been unknowingly rediscovered, but now in Wiang Haeng District. The two crash sites were one and the same.12 Wreckage collected during the earlier investigations had been turned over to local schools for a future museum; but almost all of it seems to have been subsequently lost.
Afterword: Various newspaper articles described Greco as missing in action and then being (posthumously) awarded the Flying Cross.13
As noted above, Greco was buried in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific (offsite link) in Honolulu.
References:
• Shores, 2005:14
Saturday, 25 March 1944. . . . Three Ki-48s of the 8th Sentai and 24 Ki-43s from . . . fighter sentais [at Anisakan, Meiktila, and Nawnglikio (Google Maps links)] flew . . . to the Chittagong-Cox’s Bazar (Google Maps link) area. At 0715 these raiders appeared on the radar screen, heading towards Ramu, and the 459th Fighter Squadron was ordered off. . . . No interception was made. The 459th Squadron pilots were [then] ordered to fly to Shwebo and Onbaik,15 (Google Maps link) [about 13 km east of Shwebo] in the hope of catching the raiders as they landed. If there was nothing at these bases, they were to go to Anisakan [about 100 km southeast of Shwebo]. Here they found the sky full of fighters. . . . As Boggs and Greco headed back north, they suddenly received a warning to break. Turning, Boggs saw a fighter on Greco’s tail and a second pursuing him. He managed to outrun the latter, but Greco failed to return . . .
• Umemoto, 2002:16
| 25 Mar 1944 | ||
| 459th Fighter Squadron | ||
| P-38 | ||
| Lt Anthony Greco | ||
| Maymyo17 (Google Maps link) | ||
| 204th Sentai: Ki-43 | ||
| Killed in action | ||
Umemoto comment:18 relevant text:
シュエボ飛行場、メイクテlラ西飛行場でも、何も見つけることができなかったため、P却はメイ ミョウ飛行場に向かって行った。そこは、作戦から戻り、着陸の場周飛行中の叩戦隊と204戦隊の一 式戦でいっぱいだった。ボツグズ中尉は降下攻撃にかかり、着陸中の一式戦4機を狙って長い連射を見 舞った。高度2700メートルに一式戦3機がいるのを見つけたホワイツカlヴァ!中尉は4機を引き 連れて、高度3600メートルから襲いかかった。かれらはたちまち撃墜2機を報じたが、P犯編隊の 最後尾にいたガイ・フリlマン中尉のP却が行方不明となった。
ボツグズ中尉は着陸中の一式戦の群のなかをまっすぐ飛び抜けた。デュlク中尉、スミス中尉もそれ ぞれ撃墜l機を報じた。ガ1ランド中尉と、ピlンズ中尉も不確実撃墜各l機を報じたが、ボツグズ大 尉の僚機、グレコ中尉機は一式戦に追尾されていた。別の1機、かボツグズの後方にもいた。かれらはエ ンジンを全聞にして別々の方向に逃げた。ボツグズ大尉は追っ手を振りきったが、アンソニl・グレコ 中尉の姿はなく、もはや無線で呼んでも応答がなかった。かれはボツグズ大尉の部下のなかでもっとも 古い操縦者だった。
2機のP犯と、操縦者2名を失った第459戦闘飛行隊は、一式戦6機撃墜、地上でl機撃破、撃墜 不確実5機を報じた。
204戦隊は8機撃墜を報じたが、佐分利正軍曹機、増山勝次伍長(少飛叩期)機の2機が未帰還 となり、地上では、着陸後、P認の攻撃を受けて、避撃のため、ふたたびエンジンを始動しようとして
Abbreviated translation per Google:
Finding nothing at Shwebo Airfield and Meiktila West Airfield [about 200 km south of Shwebo], the Allied pilots headed toward Maymyo Airfield, which was filled with aircraft fighters from the IJAAF 204th Squadron, returning from missions and circling the area for landing. 1Lt Boggs launched a dive attack, . . . [producing many kills], but Boggs’s wingman, 2Lt Anthony Greco, was being pursued by an IJAAF fighter and another plane was also behind Boggs. They . . . fled in different directions, Boggs managing to shake off his pursuers, but Greco was nowhere to be seen, and he did not respond to radio calls. He was the oldest pilot under Boggs [age: 26].
Missing Air Crew Report (MACR) 3968: relevant pages (click to enlarge):
Transcript of relevant text:
1. ORGANIZATION: Location Chittagong; Command or Air Force 10th Air Force; Squadron 459th Fighter
2. SPECIFY: Point of Departure Chittagong Course 84° Out; 276° Return Intended Destination: Shwebo Type of Mission Intercept
3. WEATHER CONDITIONS AND VISIBILITY AT TIME OF CRASH OR WHEN LAST REPORTED: CAVU [Ceiling and Visibility Unlimited]
4. GIVE:
(a) Date 25/3/44; Time 1045; and Location 25°, 20 miles from Mandalay of last known whereabouts of missing aircraft.
(b) Specify whether (X) Last Sighted; . . . AIRCRAFT WAS LOST, OR IS BELIEVED TO HAVE BEEN LOST, AS A RESULT OF (Check one)
(X) Enemy Aircraft; . . . .
10. Number: . . . Passengers 0; Total 1
Crew Position Name in Full Rank Serial No
Pilot Greco, Anthony H. 2nd Lt O-748966
Transcript of relevant text:
STATEMENT
I last saw Lt Greco about 40 miles West of Anisakan at about 1045 hours, March 25, 1944, after we had made contact [with] the enemy and were heading back to base.
He was flying on my wing when we were jumped from above by two Zeros. He turned a different direction in a diving evasive action with a Zero following. One Zero followed me and therefore I was unable to observe what happened to him. I did not see Lt Greco again after we broke away.
HAMPTON E BOGGS
1st Lieut, Air Corps, Pilot
Comment: note the conflicts in the various records. Shores ties Shwebo and Onbaik (Onbauk?), together, about 13 km apart, as secondary objectives for the 459th Squadron while Umemoto apparently links Shwebo and Meiktila West Airfields, about 200 km apart, as secondary objectives. Umemoto records Greco as going down at Maymyo (present day Pyin Oo Lwin) while the Allied search map centers west of Myitkyina, about 400 km NNE of Maymyo. And, ultimately, the actual crash site was found 400 km SE of his last being sighted over Anisakan.
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Last Updated on 19 February 2026
- Photo: GOV CIV guarda: P-38.[↩]
- MACR provided by Dan Jackson.[↩]
- Statement in MACR made by 1Lt Hampton Boggs.[↩]
- N21°57.32 E96°24.35[↩]
- Extract from Google Maps; annotated by author with Microsoft Publisher[↩]
- N19°39.55 E98°39.86[↩]
- Autsadaporn Kamthai, Chiangmai Mail, III: 36 (04 – 10 Sep 2004) [↩]
- [my ref: \02370 Wiang Haeng\KINTZ\Site visit results (Greco)\Photos 20180725\20180725_145849.jpg] Function of tank provided per Dan Jackson email of 10:19 31 Jul 2018.[↩]
- Per Sakpinit Promthep email of 0116 26 Mar 2019. Twelve years later, 25 Jul 2018, Bob Edgar and author found Keen Neekon who led us to the crash site. Several interviews beginning on 05 Aug 2018 were conducted by Wiyada Kantarod. A new DPAA team visited the site on 10 Dec 2018. Details remained elusive (organizationally, DPAA, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency succeeded JPAC, the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command in 2015).[↩]
- Sakpinit Promthep email of 0116 26 Mar 2019.[↩]
- Dan Jackson email of 0246 04 Feb 2020. In military jargon, the information was apparently contained in an AGRS (American Graves Registration Service Group) report kept in Greco’s IDPF (Individual Deceased Personnel File) maintained by the DPAA.[↩]
- Wikipedia: Wiang Haeng history (offsite link).[↩]
- San Francisco Examiner, 07 May 1944, p 14; Sallnas Californian, 17 Jan 1945, p 12; The Californian, 20 Jan 1945, p 2 [↩]
- Shores, Christopher, Bloody Shambles, Vol Three (London: Grub Street, 2005), p 190[↩]
- possibly Onbauk, about 13 km east of Shwebo[↩]
- 梅本弘 [Umemoto, Hiroshi], ビルマ航空戦・上 [Air War in Burma, Vol 2] (Tokyo: Dai Nippon, 2002)], pp 499.[↩]
- present day Pyin Oo Lwin[↩]
- Umemoto, ibid, p 161[↩]