I consider myself reasonably well-read on WW2 history.

But while reading a book recently on the Pacific theater - I read about the air mission to specifically target the Admiral on his travel itinerary.

I'll take 'things I didn't know' for $500 Alex.

WW2 is a source of endless learning on so many levels.

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Yes and there is a pissing match to this day of who actually did shoot him down. The mission was a great one, sans the conflict mentioned.

Best I can recall it was P 38 Lightnings that did the shoot down. A pretty formidable aircraft for the day.

Wait till you try and figure out who shot down the Red Baron. Some Aussie machine gunners, some ground folks, the guy shooting at him from a plane and several others all claimed shooting him down.

quote:

Originally posted by David Lee:
Best I can recall it was P 38 Lightnings that did the shoot down. A pretty formidable aircraft for the day.

Yes, I believe 4 P-38s were dispatched to intercept, but two had to turn back for some reason. Since the US had broken the Japanese code, they knew where and when the transport plane he was riding in was going.

There was a James Cagney movie "The Gallant Hours" (1960) which tells that story. Not a bad watch.

P-38s. The mission was possible because the US had broken the cryptographic code/cypher the Japanese used to report the flight.

This was referenced in Neal Stephensons The Cryptonomicon. It was a gamble deemed worth alerting the Japanese that we had broken their codes to kill the architect of Pearl Harbor. It was a huge morale boost for US troops and an equally hard blow to Japanese military morale. The mission was called Operation Vengeance for the obvious reason.

quote:

Originally posted by David Lee:
Best I can recall it was P 38 Lightnings that did the shoot down. A pretty formidable aircraft for the day.

Yep, P38 was one of my favorite planes from WWII (the British Mosquito and P51 Mustang being the other two).

Charles Lindbergh was also instrumental in teaching the pilots how to eke every last mile of range they could get out of the planes for the extremely long flight to the interception point.

Code breaking is a fascinating game of cat and mouse. The secret that we had broken the Japanese diplomatic code some months earlier was considered so vital that no warning was given to Pearl Harbor even though it was known that the attack was imminent. The official excuse, "there was not enough time between decryption and the attack to warn them" seems a little thin.

Code breaking, in this case a Naval code, has been credited for enabling the Midway victory. The story of how this was broken (seeding known plaintext - the water desalinator thing) seems a little too pat to me, perhaps there is a bigger secret being protected by this explanation.

It is clear that superior cryptanalysis and information management helped our side greatly in both theaters of WWII and since then in other conflicts.

quote:

Originally posted by MikeinNC:
Wait till you try and figure out who shot down the Red Baron. Some Aussie machine gunners, some ground folks, the guy shooting at him from a plane and several others all claimed shooting him down.

Nah, everybody knows Snoopy got the Bloody Red Baron.

quote:

Originally posted by John Steed:
Yes, I believe 4 P-38s were dispatched to intercept, but two had to turn back for some reason.

No. An entire squadron of P-38s flew the intercept mission with 4 P-38s assigned to engage the Mitsubishi G4M “Betty” Bomber Yamamoto would be traveling in. When they made the intercept there were 2 Betty’s and 6 escort fighters. The confusion and controversy comes from who actually shot down the bomber carrying Yamamoto as both bombers were shot down. The mission was code named Operation Vengeance.

Read the book Attack on Yamamoto as it lays out the background, the players and the mission pretty well.

Sig 209: Don't feel bad. I had not heard of this either. Damn.

quote:

Originally posted by Bassamatic:
Sig 209: Don't feel bad. I had not heard of this either. Damn.

I'm a bit surprised.

I remember reading about this is a copy of Reader's Digest...I thought it was pretty mainstream

The breaking of the code and his being shot down was in the movie Midway. I thought everybody knew that.

If you like learning about obscure WWII stuff check out Mark Felton.

This is about the flying wing...

https://youtu.be/QD3JWVSkDuU

quote:

Originally posted by mojojojo:
Read the book Attack on Yamamoto as it lays out the background, the players and the mission pretty well.

Thanks for that. I might pick that up and do some reading. Stuff like this interests me.

Yep. I wish I could remember the book, but it discussed the "debate" amongst U.S. leaders of the morality of targeting Yamamoto. Some thought it was immoral to deliberately "assassinate" him.

quote:

Originally posted by 9mmepiphany:

quote:

Originally posted by Bassamatic:
Sig 209: Don't feel bad. I had not heard of this either. Damn.

I'm a bit surprised.

I remember reading about this is a copy of Reader's Digest...I thought it was pretty mainstream

This mission was well-enough known that Hollywood recreated it, or at least loosely based an episode of the WWII 1970s TV series Baa Baa Black Sheep (Black Sheep Squadron), in which the Black Sheep were assigned the mission to shoot down Yamamoto...or whatever fictitious character they invented to play the role.