Veteran United States aviator Colonel Edward J. Komyati lays flowers to the Monument to the Aviator Martyrs in the War of Resistance Against Japan in Nanjing, capital of east China's Jiangsu Province, May 19, 2005.

About 20 veteran US aviators and their families paid a visit Thursday to the Monument to the Aviator Martyrs in the War of Resistance against Japan in Nanjing, capital of the east China's Jiangsu province.

The American Volunteer Group, who fought in China as the "Flying Tigers," was organized by Claire Lee Chennault on August 1, 1941.

Between December 1941 and September 1945, the Flying Tigers shot down and blew up 2,600 Japanese military planes, destroyed 44 warships and killed 66,700 Japanese soldiers.

Chinese and American air forces opened the famous Camel Peak Aviation Route across the Himalayas, the so-called "death route," to deliver urgently needed military supplies to support China's War of Resistance against Japan.

Over 2,000 planes from both China and the United States were used in the heroic flights, which succeeded in delivering 730,000 tons of goods by 33,477 military personnel and a flying time totaling 1.5 million hours.

The Monument to the Aviator Martyrs in the War of Resistance against Japan was completed in August 1995, and is inscribed with names of more than 3,000 martyrs in Chinese, Russian and English, including 870 Chinese, 2,186 Americans and 236 former Soviet Union soldiers.

Edward J. Komyati, aged 84 and a member of the Flying Tigers who flew three times across the Camel Peak Aviation Route between 1942 and 1945, is one of the 20 members to visit the monument.

The veteran US volunteer soldier has been devoted to the friendly exchanges between the Chinese and American peoples ever since he retired as a colonel.

The retired colonel has paid annual visits to the Monument to the Aviator Martyrs in the War of Resistance against Japan ever since 1996 by organizing groups of American youth.

Source: Xinhua