This Military Service Page was created/owned by
Sgt Duane Kimbrow (Skip)
to remember
Welshan, John Thomas, Maj.
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Major John Thomas Welshan served at Bien Hoa AB, RVN. Then, 1Lt. John T. Welshan was a pilot trained on the Dragonfly as part of "Combat Dragon" at England AFB, priot to deployment to RVN. On March 3, 1968, Welshan was assigned a frag mission in Bac Lieu Province, South Vietnam. He disappeared during that operation and was listed as MIA.
This Veteran has an (IMO) In Memory Of Headstone in Courts of the Missing at the Honolulu Memorial, Hawaii with another memorial in Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, VA.
Aircraft/Missile Information
The Cessna A-37 Dragonfly was born out of a need for close-support aircraft to assist in the Vietnam War. As such, the T-37 jet trainer was converted for the role and became the A-37 series of aircraft. The system would go on to see usage in that conflict and make its way into the inventories of other nations around the globe but in particular, throughout South America.
The A-37 differed from its training counterpart in that the Dragonfly was could field a variety of munitions on eight underwing hardpoints. Additionally, the crew of pilot and trainer was scaled down to a single pilot and increasingly powerful General Electric engines were used. The A-37A was the first of the Dragonfly series fielded and were bascially converted T-33 trainers with wintip fuel tanks and better engines. The A-37B model version featured larger fuel tanks, an inflight refuling probe for extended loitering time and a reinforced internal structure to combat the rigors of low-level combat. A Forward Air Control variant existed as the OA-37B.
Standard armament for the Dragonfly consisted of a six-barrel minigun. The underwing hardpoints could mount a variety of air-dropped munitions in the form of bombs. Additionally, the Dragonfly could engage ground targets with forward-firing high-explosive rockets and / or gunpods.