The Firebombing of Tokyo – Part 2
As fighting on Saipan continued, other units of the Allied forces were busy elsewhere. Mustang Koji’s posts offer an insight from both sides.
Fifi – the last flying B-29 Superfortress in the world. Taken by me flying over my house on November 13, 2010. Copyright Koji D. Kanemoto
Superfortress.
Or the “Superfort”.
That’s what we called them here in the States; nicknames for the Boeing B-29 bomber.
My aunt called them “地獄からのトンボ” or dragonfly from hell.
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Development
The development of the B-29 actually started before WWII began for the US – in 1939. Perhaps there were some shenanigans back then but Boeing had engineered a pressurized cockpit for their B-17 Flying Fortress (from whence the nickname Superfortress hailed from) for the USAAF. Conveniently, the USAAF put together in 1939 a call for a new bomber capable of 400 mph while carrying a 20,000 pound payload. The B-29 was born.
Destroyed Frye Packing Plant. Boeing archives.
Her development was not smooth. Indeed, it was the most advanced aircraft design of its time with…
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Posted on October 29, 2016, in Uncategorized, WWII and tagged 1940's, History, Japan, Military, Military History, Pacific, Pacific War, Tokyo, WW2, WWII. Bookmark the permalink. 44 Comments.
Pacific Paratrooper 
Excellent and very informative post on the history of the Superfortress gp, great re-post.
Enjoyed the reading.
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Koji always does a great job. With his family being on both sides of the war, it is very interesting to read his site!! [not to mention he has always been a great friend to me!!]
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You are most kind, gocox. 😊
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What can I say, it was inevitable, Koji. You did a great job on this series of posts, one I could not even have come close to – I HAD to steal it!! lol
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Are you still pre-approving comments, Gail?
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Yessiree….
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Did my comment go through? WP rejected it???
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It got here. I’ll reply on your site shortly.
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Really? It mentioned a lot of things… but there is no approval required on my comment section so your reply will just pop up publicly…
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I believe I put the ‘moderation of comments’ somewhere in the settings when I first got the blog. I knew I’d have children and/or teenagers reading and I didn’t know if some nut would start cursing or anything, so I opted for the moderation. Only you and I can see what you wrote. I’m sorry I was off-line when you wrote. I’ve started a Silver Sneakers program at the local gym (a benefit of ‘over-the-hill insurance). Same as my bout with doctors, primary is taken care of but a fee for specialists, like my surgeon.
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WP doesn’t approve a comment, I do.
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Well, what happened was I wrote that note in my Android app then when I hit send, WP (or the app) said it was rejected and I couldn’t return to what I had wrote. But in the end, it showed up on your end. 😊
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It did!!
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Have a spooky night ~~~
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As dogged with problems as the B29 was , the Russians reverse engineered three B29’s that were “stranded ” in Russia late 1944. Because the Lend Lease program did not allow giving the Russians any information on the designs, they copied them piece by piece and built their first long range bombers, the Tupolev Tu-4 , that they used for years into the 60’s. Unfortunately theirs were even more structurally unsound because the Russians did not have or know at the time how to manufacture the American higher strength aluminum alloys that the aircraft required. Very interesting story in itself.
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Koji does an excellent job on this. Besides his research, he had family ties in Japan at the time. It’s a terrific site, you should look around it.
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I still contend A Bomb not necessary. Used to intimidate USSR from post war expansion plans. Check out bombing raids history just for 1945. US bombed with impunity with very little fighter or AA opposition. The number of cities hits and casualties inflicted is astonishing. Japan collapsed already by then except for million man force in Manchuria with fuel and resources to fight a year.
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FDR had brought the bomb into existence by spending billions (at that time an unheard of amount) without the consent of Congress – it HAD to be dropped to justify the expense. Truman knew that much money couldn’t be kept a secret forever.
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Where did he get the money ? How was the expenditure kept secret ? How was the money delivered to contractors ?
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Even today with the the internet and Wikileaks, do you really think we hear everything that goes on? Stimson was involved and certain generals and sub-committees. For the US, it all began about 1939 and better researchers than I have volumes on this subject.
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Additional info in quote from Frank Duncan, a chemist and Radiation Officer:
“Congress didn’t vote on an atomic attack at all. No one outside of a VERY few even knew about the program and no one in Congress had been briefed on the existence of the weapon. Congress had voted on Dec 8, 1941 to declare war and had voted for many appropriations bills, but none knew of the existence of an atomic bomb until one was actually dropped.”
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The B-29 was certainly dogged by problems. It’s surprising it ever made it to operational status by the sound of it. But that aside, it is an incredible aircraft.
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Most definitely. Also shows why a good team was necessary on the ground with mechanics who had imagination and ingenuity.
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They definitely needed that!
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How awful about the production problems on the B-29s. It is appalling to think our men had risk their lives simply flying the planes! I could not help but think of the Arthur Miller play “All My Sons”.
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Good memory for the song, Anna. Yes, many of the crashes our men had were due to mechanical problems. I’m sure you’ve heard of the mechanics taking pieces from one plane to keep others flying, this was often the reason why.
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I didn’t like incendiary bombs fom personal experience!
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Then you can fully understand what Koji is talking about in his articles!!
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Yes indeed I’ll never forget the Jerries raining them down on us, being a kid it was a bit of fun as well as a bit frightening.I recall one night in paricular when they missed the houses completely and they landed in a long streal along the street, and everyone was out throwing sand and dirt and whatever else they thought would stop the things bursting ito flame. Soe clowns even tried stomping on them would you believe.
We got some trough our roof one night and luckily for us we had a big wate tank in the roof and the whole lot fell into that tank, I mightn’t have been here totell you about it otherwise 🙂
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Thank you for allowing us to hear your experience. It brings reality into perspective.
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Whew, the plane development sure did get off to a rocky start with the crash into the meat packing house. I found it interesting to see what fire-fighting equipment looked like in that era.
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Those fire bombs did a drastic amount of damage. There really wasn’t much left of the cities when the A-bombs went off.
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Good article of the B29 ant his bombs
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Thank you.
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I was born in 1939. So was the war…whew…
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Any stories you might have from the war era, we would all love to hear them.
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Wow,that was one very interesting article about the B29. I had no idea how man problems the plane had before it was able to do its’ job. Really good article GP!
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Koji has not done research, but he has first hand data from part of his family. A wonderful person!
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Hi! I am very interested with your works mostly about the antiquity of the World War II. If you have time, you can also read my works. They are about history of my native land, the Philippines. I will also going to post some brief summary of the history of WWII and how did affect our country from the wreak of war and how did it regain the effects from it, I hope you can read my works :>
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I am very interested in your work and will be back to your site shortly (life keeps getting in the way around here lately.)
With the wars and natural weather devastations, I have learned just how resilient the Filipinos can be!
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An interesting history of this unreliable aircraft, and the bombs that it carried. The Japanese lady gave it the right name indeed, ‘Dragonfly from Hell’. It must have seemed so, to those underneath the rain of explosives and fire-bombs.
That said, I have often been thankful that the Japanese did not have the same technology at the time. They would surely have made widespread use of such aircraft, including atomic weapons, given the opportunity. When I read criticism of the saturation bombing of Japanese (and German) cities during the war, I am reminded of the old saying. “You reap what you sow”.
Best wishes, Pete.
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I appreciate you taking the time to read Koji’s post.
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Koji’s posts about WWII are among the best.
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I whole-heartedly agree, Pierre!
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