Lampang Airfield Group

Lampang Airfield Group

The Lampang Airfield Group might today be termed the Northern Thai Air Defense Command with Lampang¹ as its center. At the time, it was apparently developed to support the plans of the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) to defend Burma, then to invade India, and finally to defend Thailand itself. The development included, first, improvements in the existing airfields at Lampang and Ko Kha, and later, the establishment of two new airstrips at Mae Mo and Hang Chat. While the Allied interpretation of the group did not include the more distant airfields in northwest Thailand of Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai, Phrae, Nan, and Kengtung, they were nonetheless subordinate to Lampang. N18°16 E99°30².³

While IJA ground forces made the improvements dictated by higher command in anticipation of the arrival of new aircraft, Japan’s industry, under onslaught from Allied air attacks, was unable to provide such aircraft. In fact, no aircraft would ever be sighted at Ko Kha, Mae Mo, or Hang Chat air facilities during Allied overflights.

((“Terrain” map from  Nations Online Project: Searchable Map and Satellite View of Thailand using Google Earth Data. Annotations by author using Microsoft Publisher. ))

Lampang was an important transport hub in northwest Thailand at the beginning of the war; facilities there included:

• An airstrip (though without scheduled connections listed)
• A rail connection to Bangkok and its Khlong Toei harbor
facilities, 600+ rail-km south,⁴ with express passenger service
scheduled twice a week⁵
• The main north-south road (Phahonyothin Road, now Route 1),
providing connections:

*  To the north, the border towns of Thailand’s Mae Sai
and Burma’s Tachilek, 282 road-km distant, with access
north to Kengtung in Burma.
*  To the immediate south, Ko Kha with Thailand’s first
sugar refinery, about 15 road-km distant. Ko Kha also
had an airstrip, for reasons as yet unclear. The next
major town to the south with an airstrip was Phitsanulok.

In 1944, two more airstrips were added to the Lampang Airfield Group, at:

• Hang Chat: about 17 road-km to the northwest
• Mae Mo: about 31 road-km to the northeast

In larger scale:

((“Terrain” map, ibid.))

Each air facility is discussed in more detail under these headings: