Looking back from a point four months after VJ-Day, this anonymous journalist recalled the first six months of the Second World War, and how ill-prepared the U.S. Navy was to take on the two-ocean war.
Looking back from a point four months after VJ-Day, this anonymous journalist recalled the first six months of the Second World War, and how ill-prepared the U.S. Navy was to take on the two-ocean war.
Looking back from a point four months after VJ-Day, this anonymous journalist recalled the first six months of the Second World War, and how ill-prepared the U.S. Navy was to take on the two-ocean war.
Looking back from a point four months after VJ-Day, this anonymous journalist recalled the first six months of the Second World War, and how ill-prepared the U.S. Navy was to take on the two-ocean war.
“Another Now It Can Be Told story – one of the best kept secrets of the Pacific war – came out last month when it was revealed that a U.S. naval group had been operating with Chinese guerillas behind the Jap lines in China. Their combined efforts, the Navy disclosed, had been a vital factor in the smashing blows of the Pacific Fleet against Jap-held islands, the Jap Navy and, finally Japan itself.”
This unnamed journalist wished to discern fact from fiction as to what was expected from Kamikaze pilots. After spending almost an entire year in Occupied Tokyo, he read numerous reports on the topic, both military and civil. The PR blather fed to the Japanese public did state that a willing death was expected of them, but was surprised to find that many (not all) of the pilots were given parachutes (rarely used). His research revealed that the Kamikaze corps was hastily assembled and was composed of the lousiest pilots they could find.
