Free Republic

One week after Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt began pressing the U.S. military to immediately strike the Japanese homeland. The desire to bolster morale became more urgent in light of rapid Japanese advances. These included victories in Malaya, Singapore, the Philippines, Wake Island, Guam, and the Dutch East Indies, as well as sinking the British battleships Prince of Wales and Repulse.Only improbable, audacious ideas warranted consideration, because submarines confirmed Japan placed picket boats at extreme carrier aircraft range. One idea even involved launching four engine heavy bombers from China or Outer Mongolia to strike Japan and fly on to Alaska. Captain...

Valor. When things were their darkest for the U.S. after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, the Doolittle Raiders gave the nation hope. Sixteen B-25s, each with a five-man crew, were lined up on the aircraft carrier USS Hornet. This had never been tried in war—sending heavy bombers off a carrier. Because the Japanese military had learned of the strategy, the planes had to take off from farther out in the Pacific than had been planned. Their mission was to hit Tokyo, but now they would lack enough fuel to reach safety beyond Japan’s borders. They went anyway. They bombed Tokyo,...

President Trump spoke by phone with the last surviving member of the famed “Doolittle Raiders” to thank the 101-year-old veteran for his service as the nation marks Independence Day. The White House said Mr. Trump “offered his best wishes and support” to retired Lt. Col. Dick Cole, a World War II veteran who was recently injured. “The president congratulated Lt. Col. Cole on his courage, thanked him for his service, and wished him a full recovery in advance of his upcoming 102nd birthday,” the White House said of the Sunday phone call.

Richard E. Cole On Monday, one of the last two surviving members of the WWII “Doolitte Raiders” will celebrate his 100th birthday. As one of the original Doolittle Raiders, retired Lt. Col. Richard Coledefied all the odds in what was considered a suicide mission to bomb Japan in 1942. Mr. Cole was co-pilot for Lt. Col. Jimmy Doolittle, who led 16 B-25 bombers on the mission that is considered an event that changed the nation’s morale following the devastating attack on Pearl harbor. He was one of 80 fighters who volunteered for the dangerous, top-secret mission. The Raiders planned...

SEATTLE — Lt. Col. Edward Saylor, one of four surviving Doolittle Raiders who attacked Japan during a daring 1942 mission credited with lifting American morale during World War II, has died. He was 94. Rod Saylor said his father died of natural causes on Wednesday in Sumner, Washington.

Live now. Last toast for the surviving raiders.

Seventy years ago this week sixteen Army Air Force B-25 Mitchells took off from the heaving deck of the Navy’s aircraft carrier USS Hornet. This was the first time in the Second World War that America took the fight to the enemy. The raiders who were led by Lt. Col. Jimmy Doolittle, struck Japan in a demonstration ofAmerica’s determination to take the fight to Japan’s home soil. This raid was a morale booster for a nation that was still recovering from the attack onPearl Harbor. The concept of launching medium bombers from a carrier was conceived by Navy Captain Francis...

The Calhoun Air Center may suddenly have a plethora of visitors in the near future. The public is invited to the airport’s second annual “Big Whoop Fly-In” on Saturday, Dec. 12 to see the facility, planes on display, and enjoy food and entertainment by more than 40 local organizations. “We have everything from retail organizations in town to banks, real estate,” Calhoun Air Center manager Ann Brinkman said. “It keeps growing and growing. We’re working really closely with Our Lady of the Gulf because we’re having a live nativity scene with animals.” Families are welcome to bring the kids out...

Nolan Herndon, a member of the famed Doolittle Raiders who bombed Japan in 1942, has died. He was 88. Herndon died Sunday of pneumonia, Edgefield Mercantile Funeral Home director David Burnett told The Associated Press on Monday. Herndon, a Texas native, enlisted on July 27, 1940, after attending two years of college, according to the Web site http://www.doolittleraider.com. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant about a year later. He also graduated from navigator training and completed bombardier training. Herndon participated in one of the most daring air raids in American history, when 16 B-25 bombers took off from an...

Only 15 men from historic World War II attack are alive today. SAN MARCOS — One April morning 65 years ago, James Doolittle launched his B-25 bomber from the seesawing deck of an aircraft carrier in the Pacific Ocean. Fifteen bombers followed in the first U.S. air raid on Japan in World War II. Reports of the raid buoyed American morale just four months after the attack on Pearl Harbor and showed the world that Japan, which had been rapidly advancing across the Pacific, was not invincible. The story of bomber crews flying at wave-top level toward their targets, knowing...

Lt. Col. Chase J. Nielsen, a Utah man and member of the famed "Doolittle Raiders" who bombed Japan in 1942 -- in a retaliation attack from Pearl Harbor -- passed away on Friday at the age of 90. Nielsen was a navigator in one of the most daring air raids in American history, when 16 B-25 bombers took off from an aircraft carrier and bombed Tokyo on April 18, 1942. Nielsen and his crew -- named "Crew 6," because of the order in which they left the aircraft carrier -- ditched the plane off the coast of China after it...

December 7th, 1941 -Pearl Harbor Remembrance! ============================================================ Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto planned the Pearl Harbor attack. Two things inspired Yamamoto's Pearl Harbor idea: a prophetic book and a historic attack. The book was The Great Pacific War, written in 1925 by Hector Bywater, a British naval authority. It was a realistic account of a clash between the United States and Japan that begins with the Japanese destruction of the U.S. fleet and proceeds to a Japanese attack on Guam and the Philippines. When Britain's Royal Air Force successfully attacked the Italian fleet at Taranto on November 11th, 1940, Yamamoto was...