During the Pre-invasion of Okinawa on 24 March 1945 the Indianapolis bombarded the beach defenses for seven days. Raining down 8in shells opened the door to get troops on the ground. On the morning of 31 March a Japanese fighter was spotted in its way to the Indianapolis. Quickly the ships 20mm gun opened fire but by the time the enemy plane was shot down it was to late. The Japanese plane dropped a bomb that blew a hole in the keel flooding nine compartments.
The Japanese army was ruthless and there duty was to serve the emperor and scarifying ones for that it was a great honor. Suicide bomber would risk their lives for combat. During the battle of Okinawa, 117,000 Japanese soldiers were there. Only 7,000 were left alive. On April 6, 355 planes were in kamikaze missions.
“The Japanese had more than 2,000,000 troops in the home lands, and were training millions of irregulars” pg. 168 Readings in United States History. President Truman was determined to find a way to have Japan surrender from the war. Truman held a conference on June 18, 1945 where he would be discussing with the chiefs to take a look at different views of approaching the Japanese. After multiple ideas along with deep thought, Truman along with the chiefs decided the most efficient, least costly and less bloody approach would to be dropping the atomic bombs on the Japanese home land.
Little did he know that the beginning of what would seem like the end would occur early the next morning. On December 7th at approximately 6:00 A.M., the first wave of 183 Japanese planes left their shores and headed towards their target of Oahu, Hawaii. Almost two hours later, according to Robert Sullivan from Time Magazine, commander Fuchida Mitsuo passed Lahilahi Point and shouted "Tora!Tora!Tora! ", which was a coded signal that confirmed the surprise attack was occurring ("Timeline of Pearl Harbor"). The actual raid began at 7:55 A.M., with the attack of the American ships Raleigh, Helena, Utah, and Oklahoma.
At the Seattle-Tacoma Airport, in Tacoma, Washington, he released thirty-six passengers and two crew members once his demands were met (Pasternak). After taking off again Cooper ordered the plane to fly at a low altitude towards Mexico. At 8:13pm pressure gauges recorded his jump over the Lewis River from 10,000ft into a thunderstorm with over a hundred mile per hour winds and negative temperatures wearing only a thin suit, wrap-around sunglasses, and a rain coat (Brad Meltzer's Decoded). Many people believe that this was a suicidal jump and that Cooper died that night (Mysterious Disappearances in U.S. History). A reporting error in this high interest case mixed up his name forever immortalizing him as D.B.
The Japanese military had already shown an unwillingness to surrender throughout the war, and this feeling was made famous by their infamous use of suicide pilots, called kamikazes. They had 5,000,000 troops scattered throughout the Pacific Theater of Operations, and an American invasion of the Japanese homeland would have lasted until late 1946 at the least, resulting in no less than 1,000,000 American deaths, according to Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson (Keene, Cornell, O’Donnell, 712). Although such an invasion was the initial plan of action, after testing of the Manhattan project in New Mexico was completed, the Atomic Bomb seemed to be a quicker solution to an already drawn out war. Towards the end of WWII America was faced with a dilemma. The Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor using Kamikaze pilots and were showing no signs of regret for it or any signs of not continuing these kinds of attacks.
The first Japanese port to be opened to foreign trade in the 16th century, Nagasaki was devastated by the second atomic bomb used in World War II (August 9, 1945). Population: 452,000. 2.Define: Island- Hopping: Island hopping is a term that refers to the means of crossing an ocean by a series of shorter journeys between islands, as opposed to a single journey directly across the ocean to the destination. Kamikaze: Japanese pilot who undertook a suicide mission. Manhattan project: A United States project lasting from August 1942 to August 1946, which developed the atomic energy program, with special reference to the atomic bomb.
It happened on an 8 square mile island that took the mane, Iwo Jima (Battle of Iwo Jima, par 1). American troops were told that their goal was to take the airfield of Iwo Jima for the future bombing of Tokyo. The Japanese were assigned to kill ten American soldiers before they had the right to die. The battle lasted from February 19, 1945 to March 26, 1945, which was a little over a month,. In thirty-six days there were nearly twenty-six thousand US casualties, almost seven thousand American troops were KIA (Hama, Erksine and Williams 98).
soon after word American and British forces joined to work together against Germany, this ends being the Manhattan Project. Many brilliant minds were gathered to work in a lab in Los Alamos, New Mexico. In the summer of 1945 the first plutonium bomb was ready to be tested after two billion dollars of spending. Three weeks later the first Atomic Bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan. The B-29 Bomber dropped the Uranium-235 called Little Boy on the Town.
When mentions of airplanes, New York, and the Middle East are placed together, it is common to think that the author is alluding to the attacks on our World Trade Center in 2001. However, this is not the case. None of the airplanes used to attack our nations came from JFK airport. When doing further reading, I noticed the author says “ whole flocks are being gassed near JFK” and that “they’re going to make the opposition pay.” It is clear now that her allusion to our country’s War on Terror. These “whole flocks” had to be fleets of planes being sent over seas to avenge the death of our nation’s tallest twins.