Air Operations, Bismarcks

50 V Bomber Command B-25s strafe coastal targets between Borgen Bay and Rein Bay.

Air Operations, CBI

• 15 11th Medium Bomb Squadron B-25s attack Hankow and Wuchang. 3 B-25s attack Changte and 14th Air Force P-40s attack sampans near Nanshien, barracks at Tachai, a town, and targets of opportunity along the Salween River.
• Largely with the support of 14 Air Force aircraft, Chinese Army ground forces retake the city of Changte, which fell to Japanese Army ground forces on December 4.

Air Operations, Europe

• XII Air Support Command B-25s attack an ironworks and a marshalling yard at Terni, and rail and road bridges and tracks at three locations.
• XII Air Support Command A-20s attack a bivouac area and gun emplacements.
• NATAF fighters and fighter-bombers attack a variety of transportation and tactical targets in and around the battle area.

• 15th Air Force B-17s attack the rail bridges at Levanto.

Air Operations, Marshalls

• 19 VII Bomber Command B-24s based at Funafuti attack the Mille Atoll.
• As Task Force 50 departs from the Marshall Islands area, 4 VF-8 F6Fs down a G4M 'Betty' bomber at sea at 1315 hours.

Air Operations, New Guinea

19 V Bomber Command B-25s and A-20s attack barges and coastal targets around Fortification Point. More than 60 V Fighter Command P-39 fighter-bombers attack targets along the Bogadjim road, coastal targets, and Japanese Army ground positions in the Ramu Valley.

Air Operations, Solomons

Torokina Field on Bougainville is declared operational. The new airfield is only 220 miles from Rabaul.

Bougainville

The newly built American airfield at Cape Torokina becomes operational. The air base is used to provice air cover for Allied troops advancing across Bougainville, but is also only 150 miles from Rabaul, well within the operational range of even fighter aircraft. The 3rd Marine Div begins a series of attack which go on until the end of the month, to take the hills that dominate the beachhead.

CBI

Chiang Kai-shek, in response to a message from Roosevelt, insists on greater financial aid and on a strengthening of the Allied air force in China. With Japanese forces increasingly over-stretched in the Pacific theater, Chinese Nationalist forces make significant gains within their own country. In a major urban battle which costs the Nationalists more troops that the Japanese, the Chinese recapture Changteh, previously held on 2 occasions by the enemy.

Eastern Front

The Soviets take Mederovo near Znamenka and attack Znamenka itself.

With the XLVIII Panzer Corps bogged down south of the Pripet Marshes, the 4th Panzer Army redeploys, the XIII Corps taking over the recently won positions of the XLVIII.

Italy

In the US 5th Army's British X Corps area, Rocca d'Evandro falls, concluding the action against the Camino hill mass. In the II Corps area, the 2nd and 3rd Battalions of the 143rd Infantry continue to be held up in the San Pietro area and pull back after dark to the line of departure while an artillery concentration is placed on the enemy. German counterattacks near Monte Sammucro are repelled. After 9 days of heavy fighting, the important peaks, Monte Camino and Monte Maggiore, are secured by the American 36th Division as the operation in the Monte Camino sector comes to an end. In the VI Corps' 45th Division zone, Hill 769 is completely cleared, but the Germans retain Legone and La Bandita.

Images from December 9, 1943

Raising the Union Jack Over Wareo, New Guinea

Captured Germans Being Searched

Captured Germans Being Searched

Canadian Engineers Construct Bridge over the Moro River