US wartime aviator's family donates Mao's gift to China

Sons of a US aviator who helped China fight against Japanese invaders during WWII have donated two blankets, which were gifted to him by Mao Zedong, to a memorial hall in southwest China's Yunnan Province.

Mao presented the blankets from Mongolia to John Paul McConnell as a token of thanks after the US pilot flew the leader to and from Chongqing in September 1945, a month after the Japanese surrender. The blankets have been well-kept by the McConnell family for more than 70 years, Xinhua reported.

Sons of McConnell, Bruce and Dorsey, made the donation to Dianxi Anti-Japanese War Memorial Hall during a recent trip to Tengchong city in Yunnan. They hoped that the blankets could serve as reminder of the friendship between the USs and China.

"I think that when Chairman Mao gave my father these blankets, he was expressing a hope -- that though circumstances might separate us for a time, one day the people of China and the people of the United States would again share deep bonds of friendship," said Dorsey.

John Paul McConnell first came to Asia in 1943 as chief of staff of the China-Burma-India Air Force Training Command at Karachi.

He was later responsible for training American and Chinese pilots as they took on the treacherous missions of transporting military supplies from India to China over the Himalayan mountains.

--IANS

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