Whirlwind - Barrett Tillman [94]
At the same time the submarine Aspro had been summoned, with Lieutenant Commander James H. Ashley, Jr., coordinating the multitiered efforts after the B-17 departed. The sub skipper had contact with the Mustangs as well as two navy Privateer patrol bombers that had just sunk a coastal transport.
About then, Japanese fighters arrived. Lieutenant Yutaka Morioka, who had lost a hand to B-29 gunners, led three other Zeros from Atsugi. He led the bounce on the top-cover Mustangs orbiting at 1,500 feet. One P-51 spun into the water on the first pass, and the fight degenerated into individual tail chases. Morioka latched on to another American but the intended victim put the spurs to his Mustang, leaving the Zero in his slipstream.
Undeterred, Morioka led his flight down to investigate the strange boat and recognized it for what it was. Making repeated runs, the Zeros fired more than 1,000 rounds of machine gun ammunition into the hardy vessel, which remained afloat though Mikes sustained minor wounds. When the Privateers turned toward the action, the Japanese departed, low on ammunition.
But the fight was not yet finished. Mikes was mere yards from Aspro when a Japanese floatplane clattered overhead, forcing the sub to “pull the plug” and dive. The two Privateers, led by the aggressive Lieutenant Commander Raymond Pflumb, met the intruder head-on and shot it down in flames.
Minutes later Aspro surfaced, as Ashley had seen the fight through the periscope. Just as Mikes prepared to hop aboard, another enemy floatplane dropped in, scoring near misses on the sub. Again Ashley took her down, still without Mikes, and again Pflumb’s team dispatched the intruder.
Finally, nearly two hours after bailing out, Ed Mikes scrambled aboard Aspro. His first words were, “Let’s get the hell out of here.”
Four Japanese fliers and one American had died in the rescue of Ed Mikes. In 1991 he met his one-handed enemy, Yutaka Morioka, who said, “I’m very sorry about our first meeting.” Then Morioka grinned. “You are alive today because our shooting was bad!”
In such meetings among once bitter enemies, perhaps both sides could agree that in war the greatest victory lay in survival.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The Harbor War
BLUE-EYED, WHITE-HAIRED ADMIRAL Chester Nimitz commanded the Central Pacific Theater and the U.S. Pacific Fleet from his headquarters on Guam. He had assumed the latter title on the last day of 1941 and steadily built his command from the oil-scummed waters of Pearl Harbor into the greatest naval striking force of all time.
Now, in 1945, America had carried the war to Japan’s home islands, and that summer the Army Air Forces and Navy, concentrating on the enemy’s vulnerable coastline, launched “the harbor war.”
As an island nation Japan was vulnerable to blockade. It imported most of the essential materials for an industrial nation, including food, 80 percent of its oil, and 90 percent of its iron ore plus other strategic materials. Pacific Fleet submarines had preyed upon Japan’s merchant marine with increasing success since 1943, and after two years Tokyo was feeling the strain. Nimitz intended to push the enemy over the edge. But he needed the Army’s cooperation to do it.
The Committee of Operations Analysts in Washington supported Nimitz’s request for a B-29 aerial mining campaign. After initial reluctance, Curtis LeMay agreed to devote part of one wing to laying mines in Japanese waterways. The operation began in late March 1945 and almost immediately proved itself. Today it remains one of the least known, most efficient, and cost-effective air campaigns in history. The airmen called it Operation Starvation.
Operation Starvation
Institutionally the AAF considered mining “the Navy’s job” and saw little in the mission to enhance the airmen’s goals. Strictly speaking, that was correct: mining choke points did nothing to reduce urban-industrial areas to smoking rubble, and there would be little to show for the effort. But beyond the parochial considerations of service pride, B-29 mining had both immediate and long-range