Posted on 10/15/2022 8:13:07 PM PDT by CheshireTheCat
On this date in 1942, three captured American airmen who had bombed Japan in the Doolittle Raid were shot in Tokyo.
The Doolittle Raid — named for its commander, Jimmy Doolittle — was America’s April 1942 retaliation for the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor a few months before.
The mission: bomb the Japanese homeland.
Later in the war, American advances in the Pacific would enable the Yankee to do this regularly. In 1942, it was all but a suicide mission.
The plan involved launching 16 B-25s from an aircraft carrier — an unprecedented feat in itself — to fly light with arms and heavy with fuel to just make it 400 miles to Honshu, and with any luck on to China before the tanks ran dry.
Considering that the bombers had to launch in a panic when the carrier group was spotted a couple hundred miles too early, the raid’s success was downright miraculous: all 16 bombers made it on to (or near enough) the mainland without being shot down, where the crews bailed out and, for the most part, escaped to allied forces. Jimmy Doolittle would title his autobiography I Could Never Be So Lucky Again.
But not all were quite as lucky as Lt. Col. (later, General) Doolittle....
(Excerpt) Read more at executedtoday.com ...
I was a Navy aircrewman, and have the greatest respect for Navy pilots, but I have to say that the greatest Naval aviators were the Army Air Corps men that flew Mitchells of the Hornet...with only enough fuel to crash or bail out in hopefully friendly territory. I often wonder these days if we as a nation are worthy of the legacy of men like that. My father had the misfortune to be a 20 year old sergeant at a place called Corregidor. I often wonder.
Damned shame.
We ust'a be the baddest MFers on the planet and NOBODY really effed with us.
We've lost our will to kill as a male population of Americans.
Read 30 Seconds Over Tokyo when I was a kid and still remember most of it
You have a better memory than I do, but I did read it, from the school library I believe.
Later in the article it says they were executed in China (Shanghai) which I believe is correct. Chinese villagers and members of Chang Kai-shek's army that were accused of helping the downed pilots were also executed.
Yes, I was in the 9th grade when I read it.
In the 10th grade I read the Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (1964); reread the book about three yearsf ago and then gave it to my son to read.
Without looking it up, I believe thousands of Chinese were murdered by Japs in retaliation for the Doolittle raid.
Amen, brother . . . I have that saved but couldn’t find it, so I clear texted.
According to Wikipedia, it is estimated that 250,000 Chinese were killed in retaliation for the raids.
damn straight !!!!
As a child Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo was the first adult book that I read. A couple years ago I participated in the flyover at the last raider’s memorial service.
It is important to remember what Japan did, not that long ago, and how the communists have now taken over America.
According to Wikipedia, it is estimated that 250,000 Chinese were killed in retaliation for the raids.
OR JUST BECAUSE THE JAPANESE FELT LIKE IT.
The war crimes and atrocities that the Japanese committed are the best kept secrets of the Second World War. The “Rape of Nanjing” is sufficient to taint their honor forever, but it is just a footnote in history. Their medical experiments on human beings surpass the atrocities of Joseph Mengele, THE ANGEL OF DEATH of AUSCHWITZ.
Very polite people, the Japanese, but like all Supremacists, they view all other people as sub-humans, animals, cockroaches.
THEY HAVE YET TO OWN UP TO IT, LET ALONE APOLOGIZE, OR LET THEIR CHILDREN KNOW WHAT THEY DID.
ARE THEY ATROCIOUS, OR ABOMINABLE? HARD TO TELL, I’M NOT A LINGUIST. BUT THEY SURE DO SUCK AT BEING HUMAN BEINGS.
” and how the communists have now taken over America.”
And, how Bidet* and his handlers would never have given the go ahead to the Doolittle raid.
“THEY HAVE YET TO OWN UP TO IT, LET ALONE APOLOGIZE, OR LET THEIR CHILDREN KNOW WHAT THEY DID.”
Causes me to reflect on the massive oppression the German people have had to deal with over the Third Reich history.
The Japanese know of nothing like what the Germans have had to endure.
One could conclude the Germans were ashamed, the Japanese proud, but I am no historian.
And, how Bidet* and his handlers would never have given the go ahead to the Doolittle raid.
BITE-ME & Co. WOULD HAVE UNCONDITIONALLY SURRENDERED ON DECEMBER 8th, 1941!!!
How many people know about the 731 Unit? Or how they were allowed to get off during the “War Crimes” farce called a trial? Only those McArthur personally embarrassed him were punished. The rest skated.
It is according to how much money their families were offered whether they would have surrendered or not. Bill Clinton, the Choice of the People set the standard for the selling of America, And the Peoplr whole heartedly approved. Ditto obama anfd Lying Joe Biden. 81 million raving approving voters can’t be wrong.
I agree completely. The Germans had it coming, but at least they hung their heads in shame, but the Japanese committed
horrible atrocities equal to the Germans (but for scale), but never had to be “REHABILITATED” because they were never called on it in the first place! My wife’s late uncle (a great guy) hated the Japanese with such a passion that he would not have anything made in Japan in his house. He was a 19 yo marine on Iwo Jima, and saw their humanity up close.
You’re right about Japanese pride. They are proud of what they did because to be otherwise, to be ashamed of their barbarity, would make them lose face, which they could never bear, even today when most of that generation has died off.
As an American, as a vet (’67-’68) that refused to execute an unlawful order (I was adjudicated right to have done so), I have less respect for the Japanese than the Germans, many of whom conducted themselves with honor. Not so for the Japanese whose Code of Honor was distorted beyond the understanding of the western mind. Still is.
(BTW, I’ve spent a lot of chopper time. Don’t care for them at all!)
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