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I send this essay around annually as an example to remind people there was a time when Americans were not only allowed, but expected to be audacious. There are so many other examples during WW II from the Battle of Midway to Eugene B. Fluckey landing a raiding party from his submarine to blow up a train on the Japanese mainland. The links are enjoyable to review as well.

One nice rthing about posting to Free Republic is that each year I get at least one comment about something I missed or mis-stated to improve it next year.

1 posted on 04/16/2014 12:17:41 PM PDT by Retain Mike
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To: Retain Mike
nice post, and thanks.
i have always thought the real significance of the raid was just this:
Japan attacked the US because it believed the US would not fight hard, and that Japan could withdraw behind a “defensive perimeter” of islands in the pacific, and as the US would try and breach that, cause so much blood to flow that the US would give up.

The fact that the Doolittle raid was really the first significant counter attack is important because it was essentially a suicide raid, signaling that there was no limit to what the US would do in war. 4 years later, every major city in Japan would be burned to the ground.

Now, as then, the big wars start when one side underestimates the others resolve.

as an interesting aside, Japan economy was roughly the same proposition in size the the US in 1941 that Russia is today to the US . think about that stat next time you hear why Russia would never start a war in the Ukraine because “it makes no sense”.

2 posted on 04/16/2014 12:31:29 PM PDT by beebuster2000
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To: Retain Mike

I have a friend that her father flew this mission. He eventually went across Russia on a train to get back home. He had wrestled in the 1934 Olympics. She swan in Mexico City in the Olympics. There are a lot of high achievers.


3 posted on 04/16/2014 12:36:07 PM PDT by mountainlion (Live well for those that did not make it back.)
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To: Retain Mike
I was at the US Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson Air Force base in Dayton, OH last week. In a display case are 80 goblets, one for each of those that flew in the Dolittle raid. They are used in an annual commemorative toast. The goblets for those who have passed are turned upside down. I sadly counted only four that are still upright.
4 posted on 04/16/2014 12:45:20 PM PDT by Fair Paul
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To: Retain Mike
I recently had the honor of meeting one of the four surviving Doolittle Raiders, Lt. Col. Richard E. "Dick" Cole (Ret.) at an airshow.
I am pleased to report that this hero is sharp as a tack, joked with me, and is in excellent health for a 98 year old man.
Lieutenant (at the time) Cole was Jimmy Doolittle's co-pilot in Crew Number One for the raid on the Japanese home land.
5 posted on 04/16/2014 12:46:46 PM PDT by Amagi (Lenin: "Socialized Medicine is the Keystone to the Arch of the Socialist State.")
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To: Retain Mike
Good article but just heads up on some technical thing as it makes it look bad...
The B25B had neither a lower ball turret or tail guns
Only the US heavy bomber ever used the manned lower ball turrets

The B25B normally had a lower Sperry rand remote controlled and sighted turret..while the B25B had them and were removed for the raiders...it was very ineffective anyway and was remove early in the war from all B25

Also the B25B normally had no tail guns..the A had a manned tail gun...the B just had a clear tail cone with no room for a gunner

The later B25s model did get a tail gun portion again I believe staring with the G model

6 posted on 04/16/2014 12:58:47 PM PDT by tophat9000 (Are we headed to a Cracker Slacker War?)
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To: Retain Mike
Thanks for the post. This was indeed a great triumph for America. It gave morale a tremendous boost in the days when there was no good war news.

One minor point is it's "Eglin Field" where the Raiders trained.

A bit of trivia. When asked where the Raiders came from, Rooselvelt replied, "They came from our secret base at Shangri-La." This was a fictional place from the novel Lost Horizon. When the Essex Class carriers were being built the Navy departed from its custom at the time and named one U.S.S. Shangri-La. Beginning in September 1944, the Japanese will again be hit from Shangri-La.

7 posted on 04/16/2014 1:01:36 PM PDT by colorado tanker
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To: Retain Mike
there was a time when Americans were not only allowed, but expected to be audacious

I occcasionally see clips of the 'X Games' on the internet. Kids doing things nobody could imagine. We Americans still have the will to be audacious, but our government education has created a subservient attitude towards government. All people want to be free.

8 posted on 04/16/2014 1:07:04 PM PDT by FatherofFive (Islam is evil and must be eradicated)
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To: Retain Mike

Great post. Thanks for sharing.


11 posted on 04/16/2014 1:16:44 PM PDT by onedoug
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To: Retain Mike

What the raid also did that was more than a moral victory, was make Japan even more determined that they need to destroy the American carriers. This made them take higher risks than they otherwise would have. This in turn led them into a plan to invade Midway and lure the American carriers to it so the Japanese could destroy them. Thanks to codebreakers and some good luck, the element of surprise was with the Americans, and instead it was the Japanese Navy that suffered the devestating loss of 4 carriers to only 1 American one. The Japanese Navy was always on the defensive after that. So the Doolittle raid was much more effective inthe grand scheme of things.


12 posted on 04/16/2014 1:18:53 PM PDT by winner3000
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To: Retain Mike

Thanks for posting this.

What’s not mentioned is that the decision to launch 170 miles earlier because of the Japanese picket ships was that every man jack on the carrier knew that there was scant chance to make it to the Chinese mainland as planned. Headwinds encountered further reduced the odds.

Doolittle spoke with the assembled crews and offered them the chance to decline the now almost suicidal mission stressing that no stigma would or could be attached under the new circumstances. Not a man hesitated.

Doolittle was the first off the deck as every member of the flight crew and ship’s deck crews held their breath. A great cheer went up as he cleared the deck and the bomber crews followed.

Flying through the squall ironically gave them cover from both Japanese ships and aircraft. And as if by some miracle the skies cleared as they approached the shores.

Doolittle’s Raiders flew so low that Japanese civilians thinking the squadron was theirs waved enthusiastically.

The Japanese were incensed by the attacked and complained long and loud to any that would listen in the international community.

The Raiders surely caused more than a few samurai wannabes to realize that they would need more than bushido to win against such men as these.


15 posted on 04/16/2014 1:49:39 PM PDT by Covenantor ("Men are ruled...by liars who refuse them news, and by fools who cannot govern." Chesterton)
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To: Retain Mike

I very nice article, the only thing I think that needs fixing is I don’t believe there was a “Pentagon” in 1942. It was under construction, or in the planning stage. It was pretty much just called the “War Department” before the Pentagon came into use.


16 posted on 04/16/2014 2:16:10 PM PDT by Lockbar (What would Vlad The Impaler do?)
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To: rlmorel
ping...
19 posted on 04/16/2014 4:20:45 PM PDT by Chode (Stand UP and Be Counted, or line up and be numbered - *DTOM* -vvv- NO Pity for the LAZY - 86-44)
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To: Retain Mike
Doolittle was the first off the deck


22 posted on 04/16/2014 6:27:39 PM PDT by Flag_This (Liberalism: Kills countries dead.)
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To: Retain Mike; zot

Thanks for the reminder — 72 years ago tomorrow.


24 posted on 04/17/2014 10:05:24 AM PDT by GreyFriar ( Spearhead - 3rd Armored Division 75-78 & 83-87)
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To: Homer_J_Simpson

ping.


25 posted on 04/17/2014 10:23:42 AM PDT by Rebelbase (Tagline: optional, printed after your name on post)
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