Saturday, February 7, 2009

Doolittle raid

Doolittle raid story is a true story about the first air raid by the United States on the Japanese island of Honshu on April 18, 1942 during World War II. The raid demonstrated that Japan itself was somewhat vulnerable to Allied air attacks and provided an expedient means of retaliation by the US in response to Japan's earlier attack on Pearl Harbour in Hawaii on Dec 7, 1941.
The raid was planned and led by Lt. Col. James "Jimmy" Doolittle, who later recounted in his autobiography that the raid was intended to cause the Japanese to doubt their leadership and to raise morale among the Americans which was badly needed.Until then, the Japanese had been told that they were invincible, but the attack on the Japanese homeland caused confusion in their minds and many began to doubt the reliability of their leaders.
However, the US managed to formulate a plan to strike back by assembling a team of dare-devil fighters on secret mission across the Pacific for a long-haul bombing raid on Tokyo five months later. The US air crew was forced to launch the mission much earlier after their aircraft carrier was spotted by a Japanese ship, knowing very well that they might not have enough fuel to help them land at a designated zone in China after the bombing mission.

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