Posted on 04/11/2015 1:41:34 PM PDT by NEWwoman
And I felt compelled to write this blog post will news of the passing of Robert Hite, March 29. Only two are left.
We all are in deft to this men to their service and sacrifice to our country.
Thanks for posting this, NEWwoman. God bless them all.
Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo was on TCM last night.
It tells volumes about how abysmal public education in general and collegiate journalism curricula in particular are when a piece like this could possibly be written with an assumption that there would be people reading it with so little knowledge of the second world War as to be clueless about the Doolittle raids.
Thank you, laplata, for your encouragement.
Great movie, AEMILIUS PAULUS. It took me a while to figure out the captain, played by Van Johnson, was the one that wrote the book and he really did lose his leg.
Right, MrEdd. I recall in Reagan’s last speech as president, he urged parents to teach their children at the dinner table - and he mentioned those 30 seconds over Tokyo and the Doolittle Raid
Many thanks for the link, DuncanWaring
I guess in the long run it worked out OK as it probably led to the battle of Midway.
Still I wonder if it was really worth it. We lost 16 scarce B-25s and most of the crews for very little damage to Japan.
I know, it was to boost morale. Still I don’t think it was a good idea. Of course if they had launched maybe 500 miles closer to Japan, they may have saved most of the planes.
Still amazing that the US defeated Germany and Japan in less time than it took 0bama to build a website that didn't work.
The raid was of little military importance. In fact if you look at the losses verses the damage it inflicted it was a military disaster. However, war is both on the battlefield and in the mind of the enemy. The warlords of Japan swore not one American bomb or soldier would ever hit Japan. Four short months later we dropped bombs on them. It was a raid with a terrible price for our airmen.
Most importantly the warlords then knew we would kill them in the end. Yamamoto counseled the warlords against this raid. He was educated in the United States and knew what would happen. Fortunately the warlords were wrong and Yamamoto was right. The attack on Pearl Harbor awakened the sleeping giant.
The raid was insignificant but the psychological effect was like the hammer of Thor. Although it was done at great sacrifice it was a good call by our president and military.
The sheer magnitude of WWII is amazing.
The Germans bagging a million Russian POWs in a single battle and more than once. Germans losing hundreds of thousands in prolonged battles.
Hundreds of planes or tanks lost in single battles. Thousands of ships engaged in battles.
Nothing like it since or ever again.
Thank you for posting this reminder of the Doolittle Raiders and LTC Hite’s recent passing.
“Now only two of the original Doolittle Raiders survive as I type (April 11, 2015): retired Lt. Col. Richard Cole and Staff Sgt. David Thatcher.”
I though you were going to talk about the spelling and grammar in the story. Did you know, for example, that sixteen B-25’s launched from the _desk_ of the USS Hornet???
Coincidentally, I'm reading "The Aviators" (about Doolittle, Rickenbacker and Lindbergh) and I just finished reading the assessment of the Doolittle Raid. The author said that the raid caused the Japanese to shift assets to the defense of Japan that had previously gone to their offensive efforts. It did lead to Midway, like you said; but most importantly, the U.S. intercepted more Japanese military radio traffic than they had ever intercepted before, as a direct result of the raid. Before the raid the U.S. was able to decipher about 10% of the Japanese military code, but a week after, they were deciphering 50%.
No kidding. That’s the big difference between a ‘can do’ attitude and a ‘hope-n-change’ attitude.
‘though’ should be ‘thought’...
I went to military school with his son and his father addressed the corps at chapel one day.
Those American workers of the 30s and 40s were about as good as it gets.
For instance, the Hoover Dam, The Empire State Building and other construction projects were typically built ahead of schedule and under budget.
Our production capacity in WWII was not just luck. It was due to hard work and ability. A shipyard in Washington State once built a liberty ship in 3 days.
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