Army & Navy: Two on the Chin

The unique characteristic of U.S. heavy bombers that makes possible daylight raids on such far-flung objectives as Ploesti, Danzig and Gdynia is their tremendous fire power. Within practical range (1,000 yards) of their .50-caliber machine guns, enemy fighters must pay dearly to knock down bombers.

Last week the U.S. Army Air Forces approved announcement of an improvement: the separate hand-operated front guns of the Flying Fortress had been reset in a power-operated turret under the nose. Airmen's name for the addition: "chin turret."

Designed for more effective resistance to head-on enemy attacks, the chin turret is an opposite number to the power turret recently installed in Liberators (B-24). It is remotecontrolled, allows the aimer to bring two guns instead of one to bear on any attacker.