Whirlwind - Barrett Tillman [57]
Ignoring his squadron mates, reporters focused on Muto, attributing all four kills to him in a solo battle against a dozen Americans. His wife, Kiyoko, heard the reports shortly after delivering their daughter, thrilled to know her flier was not only safe, but famous. The press dubbed Muto “the Miyamoto Musashi of the air,” after the legendary swordsman best known as author of The Book of Five Rings.
Elsewhere, airborne Japanese were scarce. Lieutenant Commander Fritz Wolf, the former Flying Tiger, took eight Yorktown Hellcats in low, just beneath the overcast, and pressed on to Konoike Airfield east of Osaka. Recalled one pilot, “The apron was packed with neatly parked aircraft which went up in flames as we pumped our .50s and rockets into the sitting ducks. Only one machine gun was firing at us, so we made three passes.” After the last run the Yorktowners counted nine destroyed and twenty-one damaged.
The fifth fighter sweep launched from Rear Admiral Frederick C. Sherman’s Task Group 58.3, the same “Ted” Sherman who had the old Lexington (CV-2) sunk from under him at Coral Sea nearly three years before. His pilots were assigned targets to the west, resulting in the first Navy planes over Tokyo. Better weather farther inland permitted strike leaders to hit targets in the forenoon period, notably in the capital’s northwest industrial area. The Ota aircraft plant was hit successively, following up B-29 attacks.
That afternoon Bunker Hill’s Avengers and Helldivers finished off the Nakajima aircraft factory at Ota. But Japanese army fighters took a toll; in its first day at war Bunker Hill’s Air Group 84 lost four planes: two bombers and two fighters with eight fliers.
Other units took even heavier losses. Since November, Wasp’s Hellcats had logged half a dozen small battles over the Philippines and Formosa, but Tokyo was the big league. Fighting Squadron 81 lost five pilots in its first major operation, as much the victim of their own overeagerness as the skill of Japanese pilots. The Wasp fliers claimed fifteen kills but it was a poor exchange. “The old lesson was learned the hard way again,” said Commander Frederick J. Brush, who noted young pilots’ tendency to break formation.
Despite widespread combats that ranged from the clouds down to street level, some pilots found no action at all. The new Hornet’s Ensign Willis Hardy spoke for disappointed fighter pilots when he said, “We, being high cover over the Yoko end of town, didn’t see any of Tokyo and not even a peek at Fuji san.”
On the last strike of the day a mixed bag of Japanese army fighters caught up with egressing Americans between the Ota engine factory and the coast, initiating a half-hour running battle. San Jacinto’s Commander Gordon E. Schecter led his Hellcats in protecting the bombers. Previously a floatplane pilot, he had learned the fighter trade well. Schecter gunned down four planes that morning and then, in the evening shootout, he destroyed a Tojo and probably an Oscar. Turning to meet each attack, his fighter pilots claimed nine more. But some Japanese got through the U.S. escorts. Backseaters in Helldiver dive bombers manhandled their twin .30 caliber mounts while Avenger torpedo plane gunners drew a bead in their power-operated turrets. San Jacinto and Lexington bombers claimed three kills and several damaged before reaching the coast.
On the biggest day of air combat since the Marianas Turkey Shoot, carrier aviators believed they shot down 291 enemy planes. Six Hellcat pilots gained the status of ace in a day. But it appears that the actual toll was forty-four Imperial aircraft. The sixfold error was due to several factors, including inexperience: well over half the Americans were new to combat, and only experience could teach a pilot what a genuine kill looked like, as opposed to nonlethal damage on a bandit.
American losses were fifty-two carrier planes. Hardest hit was Bennington’s new Air Group 82, with a dozen aircraft missing. Meanwhile, the six Marine squadrons got an especially rough initiation