INFANTRY MEN IN TRAINING NEAR ORAN. Training centers for all arms were opened in French Morocco and Algeria soon after the end of hostilities there in November 1942.
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PARACHUTE TROOPS CHECKING EQUIPMENT before boarding planes for practice jump. These troops were essentially infantrymen and were armed with infantry weapons. Their boots, higher than the infantry shoes, were constructed to give ankles a maximum amount of protection when landing.
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PARATROOPERS DURING TRAINING JUMP. Light artillery, food, and light vehicles were dropped separately with different colored parachutes, or came in by glider.
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DOUGLAS C-47 TRANSPORT TOWING GLIDER. The gliders carried both men and equipment and could be landed in almost any flat pasture. The C-47 aircraft—the work horse of the war—was similar to the commercial DC-3, a standard type passenger carrier in the United States for some years prior to the war. The C-47, unarmed, was used during the war for carrying personnel and cargo of all sorts, towing gliders, dropping parachute troops, and parachuting supplies to isolated units and equipment to partisans behind enemy lines. The British called it the Dakota.