[NKP_Vet]

Dedicated to the brave sailors that died or were wounded defending their country. Their sacrifices will never be forgotten. Semper Fi.

"The USS Laffey survived despite being badly damaged by four bombs, six kamikaze crashes, and strafing fire that killed 32 and wounded 71. The assistant communications officer — Lt. Frank Manson — asked Captain Becton if he thought they'd have to abandon ship, to which he snapped, "No! I'll never abandon ship as long as a gun will fire." Becton did not hear a nearby lookout softly say, "And if I can find one man to fire it."

[Inyo-Mono]

Incredible!

[snooter55]

bfltr

[lwd]

for later

[Fresh Wind]

Nuke ‘em!

[Vinnie]

for later

[Charles Martel]

That's a very nicely done video. Just the right amount of computer enhancement, which hides pretty well in black & white. There's some stock footage in there (I've seen the scene with the chaplain before), and I'm pretty sure the audio for the call to General Quarters (approx. 1 minute in) is taken from In Harm's Way.

[Sergio]

bkmk

[Conan the Librarian]

Still afloat (or grounded) in Charleston Harbor next to the Yorktown.

Worth the trip to visit.

[gura]

That's just an excellent book. If I remember correctly our invasion fleet at Okinawa numbered around 1700 ships. The Japs weren't even able to launch twice that many kamikaze attacks against that fleet.

Still it makes no sense why they dribbled them out a few at a time instead of one mass attack to overwhelm our defenses.

[MasterGunner01]

USS LAFFEY (DD-724) gained the reputation as “the ship that would not die”. These were very brave men.

If you want to see and feel what it was like to under go a kamikaze attack, one of the best movies to show this is “Away All Boats”, the story of a fictional Attack Transport (APA) in the Pacific War. Jeff Chandler portrays the CAPT Hawks and George Nader is LT McDougall.

The high point of the battle off Okinawa is the kamikaze raid on the transport area. It is positively chilling. The only way to effectively kill a kamikaze was with a hit from a 5-inch gun. The 40mm Bofors would just blow chunks off the Japanese aircraft but did not necessarily destroy them. If the kamikaze got within 20mm Oerlikon range, you could be assured you were going to take a hit. Okinawa was the only battle the Navy fought in the Pacific where the KIA numbers were higher than the WIA and MIA numbers. To say it traumatized the USN would be an understatement.

[norwaypinesavage]

My FIL was on a 'Jeep Carrier', the Corregidor, in the Pacific. They were attacked by kamikazes on several occasions, though not this intensively. His day job was aircraft mechanic, but was a side gunner for general quarters. He was convinced that no kamikaze pilot ever struck a target while still alive. The AA fire was just too intense. He described it as "snow, going up", due to the tracers in every third cartridge.

He described one occasion where a kamikaze airplane was in coming low, like the last one in the video. He thought it was going to hit, until one of the "big guns" knocked off a wing and set it afire. That caused it to hit the water, then catapult over the deck. He said he could feel the heat of the flames as it went over. That's close. His ship, though, was never hit. It went through "Halsey's Typhoon" and developed a crack in the hull, as the Liberty Ships were wont to do.