Whirlwind - Barrett Tillman [76]
The cost to the Americans for scorching three square miles was one bomber that splashed at sea. The crew was rescued the next day.
* * * * *
Although the four missions after March 10 each destroyed two to eight square miles of urban area, they were disappointing by Tokyo standards. But operations analysts recognized that the first strike had been a rarity: seldom would the same factors combine to raze sixteen square miles in one mission. Compressing the bomber stream, proper bomb release interval, and strong surface winds all were necessary to produce a major firestorm.
Overall, in five missions 1,434 sorties burned or damaged thirty square miles in four cities. In return, the blitz exacted a toll of twenty-one Superforts.
Hap Arnold sent a congratulatory message to XXI Bomber Command, concluding, “This is a significant sample of what the Jap can expect in the future. Good luck and good bombing.”
LeMay celebrated by indulging in a box of Havana cigars cadged from the Navy post exchange. His stash of pipe tobacco had mildewed in the tropic climate and he did not favor the American cigars stocked by the Army PX.
Meanwhile, XXI Bomber Command staff well knew that the blitz could not be sustained, nor was it expected to. Five maximum efforts in ten days left the maintenance crews slumped in exhaustion. Additionally, the command had depleted its stock of incendiaries, and the Navy would not deliver the next two shiploads until April 9.
The View from Tokyo
Japanese officials reeled with the implication of Blitz Week. They had seen that America’s vast resources could be massed in homeland airspace almost without limit, inflicting appalling damage while sustaining small loss. The Americans’ sudden shift to low-level attack with incendiary weapons had changed the nature of the air campaign, literally overnight. Freed of the doctrinal tether of high-altitude precision bombing, the B-29s now could sweep away factories by the dozens, rather than trying to hit them singly from 30,000 feet.
A reasoned assessment was made by Lieutenant General Noboru Tazoe, commanding the 5th Air Division. After the war he stated, “It became apparent in March 1945 that Japan could not win the war when the B-29s wrought extensive damage, especially in the case of small factories scattered throughout the cities.”
Apart from the enormous damage inflicted on Japan’s industrial infrastructure, another factor quickly emerged: absenteeism. The Swiss Red Cross reported from Nagoya, “After the first B-29 raid with fire bombs, fear became so great that workers began remaining at home merely because they were afraid to be caught in war plants when another raid might strike.”
Physically and psychologically, Japanese industry was being dismantled. But Tokyo fought on.
Meanwhile, Emperor Hirohito insisted on seeing the carnage for himself. His retainers were concerned that an Imperial motorcade would draw the Americans’ attention, so a small convoy was arranged with minimal security and no advance notice. Palace staffers had ventured far enough afield to acquaint themselves with the situation. They were appalled, returning with ghastly tales of mounded bodies melted together in barriers over two meters high. Nevertheless, on the 18th—eight days after the Tokyo calamity and the same day as Nagoya II—the emperor ventured forth.
As crown prince, the twenty-two-year-old Hirohito had ridden a horse through much of Tokyo’s rubble following the catastrophic earthquake and fire