TY  - BOOK
AU  - Heimann,Judith M.
TI  - The airmen and the headhunters: a true story of lost soldiers, heroic tribesmen and the unlikeliest rescue of World War II 
SN  - 9780151014347
AV  - D810.S45 B65 2007
U1  - 940.54/25983 22
PY  - 2007///
CY  - Orlando
PB  - Harcourt
KW  - United States
KW  - Army Air Forces
KW  - Bomb Group, 5th
KW  - Squadron, 23rd
KW  - History
KW  - World War, 1939-1945
KW  - Search and rescue operations
KW  - Borneo
KW  - Aerial operations, American
KW  - Airmen
KW  - Biography
KW  - Dayak (Indonesian people)
N1  - Includes bibliographical references (p. [273]-279) and index
N2  - November 1944: Army airmen set out in a B-24 bomber on what should have been an easy mission off the Borneo coast. Instead they found themselves facing a Japanese fleet--and were shot down. When they cut themselves loose from their parachutes, they were scattered across the island's mountainous interior. Then a group of loincloth-wearing natives silently materialized out of the jungle. Would these Dayak tribesmen turn the starving airmen over to the Japanese occupiers? Or would the Dayaks risk vicious reprisals to get the airmen safely home? The tribal leaders' unprecedented decision led to a desperate game of hide-and-seek, and, ultimately, the return of a long-renounced ritual: head-hunting. This survival story features a bamboo airstrip built on a rice paddy, a mad British major, and a blowpipe-wielding army that helped destroy one of the last Japanese strongholds.--From publisher description
ER  -