In December 1941, the U.S. Pacific Fleet docked at Pearl Harbor was attacked by Japan and suffered heavy losses.
It was also from this moment that the Pacific War officially began, and all the secret moves of both sides were put on the table.
Since Japan can use air strikes to take the United States by blood, then the United States can also kill Japan by surprise, so it aimed its attention at the enemy's homeland, and if you hit my forward position, I will bomb your base camp.
The plan to attack Japan was not a temporary idea, as the U.S. Army had quietly drawn up this plan long before the Pacific War, flying P-40 fighter jets and secretly participating in China's air force operations to seek air raids against Japan.
When Japan officially declared war on the United States, the United States was finally free to do a big job, but it needed to carefully consider what tactics it should adopt, what type of aircraft type, and which target to attack.
The United States reviewed and found that its own twin-engine bomber had limited endurance and could not fly to the Japanese mainland at all, so it could only consider using the aircraft carrier as a launch platform and then pairing it with a B-25 medium bomber.
And when they hit military targets, the bombers can also fly over the East China Sea and finally land safely in China.
After the operational policy was settled, the United States handed over the heavy task of the first air attack on Japan to Lieutenant Colonel Doolittle, an ace pilot, and gave him a month to modify the planes and train the pilots.
After that, sixteen B-25 bombers were delivered to the front line of the sea to aim at the Japanese archipelago, and everything was ready.
On April 18, Doolittle divided the pilots into groups and bombed six locations, including Tokyo, Yokohama, Nagoya, and Kobe.
When Doolittle's plane was the first to arrive over Tokyo, many Japanese people saw the bomber and thought it was a friendly force, so they waved it directly, never thinking that the enemy plane would dare to run over their head and spread wild.
The first round of bombing of Tokyo began in earnest.
The Japanese Iron and Steel Corporation, the Nagoya Aircraft Factory, the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Corporation and other military enterprises, as well as some power companies, military hospitals, schools, etc., were seriously damaged, killing a total of 87 people and seriously injuring 151 others.
Strictly speaking, the damage caused by this air raid to Japan was not large, but the strategic significance was significant.
On the one hand, the United States vented the evil anger at Pearl Harbor to boost morale, and on the other hand, it also made the unscrupulous Japan have some scruples and spare its energy to defend its home.
The front page of the New York Times directly emphasized that -
"For more than 2,000 years, Japan has prided itself on sacred territory and has never been attacked, but now we are hovering in their airspace and dealing a powerful blow to the heart of Imperial Japan. 」
After the air raid, the Japanese army was first shocked, then angry, and quickly launched the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Campaign, trying to destroy the airfields in Quzhou, Yushan, Lishui and other places in Zhejiang Province to prevent the American pilots from landing safely.
Subsequently, the Japanese army also launched a frenzied sweeping operation, capturing American pilots while carrying out massacres in many places on the mainland, causing about 250,000 Chinese civilian casualties.
To some extent, the cost of the US bombing of Japan was borne by the Chinese.
After the Doolittle air raids, the US military repeatedly attacked the Kuril Islands in mid-1943, but the damage caused was small.
Because the B-25 and B-17 bombers that the US military has been using are not good enough in terms of comprehensive performance, this is also an important reason for the failure of many air raids.
And the B-29 bomber ready for service can be described as a timely rain for the US military.
As a bomber customized for the Asian theater, the B-29 bomber is very good in terms of performance, range, bomb load, etc., and is named the "Super Flying Fortress".
The U.S. military also transferred Major General Curtis Lemay, who had been bombing Germany for more than a decade, to command the first B-29 bomber wing.
The experience of this Major General Li Mei is legendary.
Unlike Star-Filled General MacArthur, Li May did not have a distinguished family background and was not a graduate of the West Point Military Academy, but he was still promoted to the youngest major general in the U.S. Army at the age of 37 with his outstanding achievements.
Stubborn, ruthless and persistent, Li Mei adhered to the credo of "bombing is king", and was a genius who elevated air combat to an art, commanding many major battles and taking the lead in each operation.
At the same time, the US air strikes against Japan exposed a number of problems.
For example, from June to December 1944, the U.S. military bombed a total of 20 times and dropped nearly 1,000 tons of bombs, but the actual damage caused to the Japanese mainland could not even cover the cost of artillery shells.
According to the official documents of the U.S. Army, logistical supply difficulties, B-29 engine failures, and inefficient bombing were important factors in the failure of the air raid.
In view of the above-mentioned problems, the US Army Air Force made some adjustments in a timely manner.
First, the sortie base was moved from Chengdu on the mainland to the newly built Mariana Islands airfield in the western Pacific Ocean, because it was less than 2,500 kilometers away from Japan, making it the best sniper position.
At the same time, the U.S. military removed Brigadier General Hansel, who was in charge of the main attack, and let Li Meilai take over personally.
In addition to the problems listed above, Li Mei also found a problem, that is, the high-altitude bombing tactics that Europe used to use were not applicable to Japan.
Because there are often strong high-air currents above 7,000 meters above Japan, and the clouds are particularly thick, which seriously affects the accuracy of bombing, the average hit rate of bombs is only 5%, which is miserable.
After several futile air raids, Li Mei believed that her judgment was not wrong, and when it was difficult to solve the problem of Japan's high-altitude currents, she blindly adopted the previous precision bombing tactics, which was just in vain.
And the miraculous effect of the incendiary bomb also made Li Mei's eyes shine, and he found that Japan, like China, is mostly mainly wooden buildings, so why not use large-scale incendiary bomb tactics?
He first conducted a "large experiment", sending 172 B-29 bombers to drop more than 500 tons of incendiary bombs on Tokyo, as a result of which 2.6 square kilometers of buildings were completely destroyed.
At this moment, the battle situation was finally opened.
In the early morning of March 10, 1945, Li Mei officially launched a large-scale arson operation against Tokyo, which is also known as the "March Fire Attack".
Li May gambled everything for this operation, because he did not petition Admiral Arnold's approval before launching the attack, perhaps to protect the old leader.
After all, the tactics of this operation have violated the precision bombing instructions that the military has always adhered to, and the tactic of dropping incendiary bombs on a large scale is still in the experimental stage and has not been approved by the military.
As it turned out, Li Mei was right again.
Under his command, 346 B-29 bombers dismantled most of the defensive cannons, loaded them with incendiary bombs, and flew to Tokyo at two o'clock in the morning to carry out the tactics of dropping bombs at a low altitude of 1,500 meters.
In order to expand the results of the battle, Li Mei first sent the ace pilot Boris to drive the bomber to accurately drop incendiary bombs, burning a huge flame cross in the center of Tokyo, marking the comrades in the rear - throwing it to death.
At the same time, in order to strengthen the combustion effect, Li Mei arranged for 10 bombers to dump dozens of tons of gasoline into the "baking field".
After some subtle operation, how does it work?
1,665 tons of incendiary bombs poured out, and the wooden house, which looked "strong", collapsed in a few hits under the fire attack.
Moreover, in the "well-timed" wind, the fire was even more out of control, quickly spreading to all sides, causing a larger area of fire, just like the Tokyo version of the fire red cliff.
Those who were not burned to death at the first time fled from the house and jumped into the water tank, bath, and river, but under the power of the accelerant, the fire continued to burn and even boiled the water.
There were wails at the scene, and I won't release more tragic pictures.
According to rough statistics, the air raid destroyed a large number of military enterprises, burned 41 square kilometers of buildings, or 7% of the urban area of Tokyo, while 83,000 people were killed and 40,000 were injured.
The U.S. military lost only 14 B-29 bombers and another 42 were damaged by anti-aircraft guns, but they were still able to return safely.
See the amazing results, starting from March 11th. Li Mei carried out bombing campaigns on Nagoya, Osaka, Kobe, and other major cities, and the ground in Japan was hot and hot throughout March.
After withstanding the March offensive of the American army, the Japanese frantically counterattacked, launched a large-scale kamikaze air raid on the Allied fleet, and used suicide ramming, blowing up and sinking many warships and transports.
However, Li Mei remained unmoved, and in view of the weakness of Japan's poor air defense, she launched a barbecue offensive and carried out continuous bombing of various cities and key buildings in Japan.
Until a month before Japan's surrender, under the command of Li Mei, the bomber group visited all Japanese cities, and many key cities were even bombed several times until they were completely paralyzed.
According to the comprehensive data compiled by Japanese and American officials and various agencies, from March to August 1945, the U.S. bombing of Japan killed about 500,000 people and left 5 million homeless.
In addition to a large number of civilian casualties, more than 600 large factories were blown up, causing a sharp drop in Japanese industrial production.
The loss caused by the "Li Mei barbecue" was more than 7 percent, and since then Li Mei has become a nightmare for all Japanese people.
In fact, in the last few months of the war, Japanese civilians have long been eager to surrender, but the right-wingers still want to stand up and feel that they can still do it, even if the whole of Japan is bombed into potholes, as long as they do not die, there is hope, and if they hold on, they can drag down the US army, and they will break 100 million people.
On August 6-9, 1945, the United States planted two large mushrooms in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The large-scale and indiscriminate nuclear deterrence made the Japanese government, especially the senior officials, suddenly honest and surrender on August 10.
Because the visual effects of the "Li Mei barbecue" and the atomic bombing were so stunning, after the end of the war, the question of whether it was moral to attack Japan by air caused controversy in the world.
However, no matter how much the international community is hustle, if we really want to compare the atrocities committed by the Japanese army in the land of China and the whole world, then the bombing losses suffered by Japan are only a drop in the middle.
General Li Mei is, of course, an anti-fascist hero, but it is not necessary to say that he is kind to the Chinese nation and an international friend.
Because before the fire in Japan, he first practiced in China and had an accident.
According to the Wuhan City Chronicle, on December 18, 1944, under the command of Major General Li Mei, the 20th Bomber Command sent 92 B-29 bombers loaded with a large number of incendiary bombs to bomb the Japanese-occupied area of Wuhan.
Although before the air strike, the US military dropped leaflets and secretly posted slogans to warn Wuhan citizens to evacuate early.
However, due to the wrong order of throwing, only a few incendiary bombs were dropped into the Japanese-occupied areas, and most of them were dropped into residential areas, causing a large number of casualties among Chinese people.
"The fire burned for three days and three nights, and most of the center of Hankow was reduced to rubble, and until December 1945 it was a blank field, and more than 40,000 civilians were killed or injured in the bombing, including more than 25,000 deaths. 」
Li Mei can't wash away this stain, or maybe he doesn't care much at all.
As he once said, "A soldier is not a good soldier if he is too concerned with the morality of war and is deeply troubled." 」
So for Li Mei, the bombing is everything, and the rest can't even talk about floating clouds.
From the perspective of the national level, there are no permanent friends and no permanent enemies, and interests and contradictions are always entangled with each other.
As far as national sentiment is concerned, remembering history is not exaggerating hatred, but remembering the blood shed by our ancestors to resist the invaders, remembering the shame of being beaten if we are backward, and avoiding the repetition of history.
[Selected References]
1, James S. M. Scott: "The Bombing of Tokyo: 1942, the Americans' Battle for Revenge on Pearl Harbor"
2. Malcolm Gladwell: "War and Addiction"
3. University of Chicago Press: The Pacific: From Matthorn to Nagasaki
4. Philip Mellinger: "B-29 Air Battle against Japan"
5. Military Digest: "The Punishment of "Heavenly Fire": The United States Bombs the Japanese Mainland"
6. Barrett Tillman, "Whirlwind: The Air War Against Japan, 1942-1945"
7. Bethold Zewald: "The Largest Conventional Air Raid of All Time"
8. Liddell Hart: A History of the Second World War
9. Liang Hui: "On the Strategy of the United States Toward Japan in Wartime"
10. Richard Frank: "The Long-Term Impact of the Bomb"
11. Kuang Ji: "The Beginning and End of the Tokyo Bombing - The United States' Strategic Bombing of Japan during World War II"
12、席康：《东京大轰炸真相》