there 27 February 1941. In February 1941, as the war in Europe raged, the unit was ordered to active service, performing antisubmarine patrols off the coast of New England. In 1943, the 103rd finally moved into the latest combat aircraft. First, the pilots and maintenance personnel were given steady upgrades in equipment beginning with the P-39 Airacobra, P-40 Warhawks, and then the B-25 Mitchell. Eventually this culminated in training on the photo-reconnaissance variant of the P-38 Lightning called the F-5C. The twin-engine F-5C had all of the P-38's guns replaced by cameras. After a year's worth of training, the 103rd deployed to the China-Burma-India (CBI) Theater of war in 1944 where it operated out of various fields in India and Burma. It was heavily involved in photo reconnaissance activities over Burma, supporting the US Army forces fighting the Japanese in the jungles there. The 103rd personnel stayed in that theater until the end of the war. Pennsylvania Air National Guard The wartime 40th Photographic Reconnaissance Squadron was re-designated as the 103rd Bombardment Squadron and allotted to the Pennsylvania Air National Guard, on 24 May 1946. It was organized at Philadelphia International Airport, and was extended federal recognition on 20 December 1948 by the National Guard Bureau. The 103rd Bombardment Squadron was bestowed the history, honors, and colors of the 40th PRS. The squadron was equipped with B-26 Invader light bombers and assigned to the 111th Bombardment Group. Korean War Activation The 103rd was federalized on 10 October 1950 along with its parent 111th Composite Wing due to the Korean War. Many of the pilots and maintenance personnel were split off and sent for duty overseas as individuals assigned to other combat units there. Eventually the B-26 bombers were sent as reinforcement aircraft to Far East Air Force for use in Korea. On 10 April 1951 the squadron and Wing were moved to Fairchild AFB, Washington and re-equipped with RB-29 Superfortress reconnaissance aircraft. Based on the World War II B-29 Bomber, the RB-29s were instead configured with multiple aerial cameras for mapping and reconnaissance missions. These RB-29s were used like the reconnaissance satellites of today, except they required actual over flight of the countries to be photographed. On 13 June 1952, two 111th pilots were flying an RB-29 over the Soviet Union when they were shot down by a pair of MiG-15s. The RB-29 was never recovered, having crashed in the