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Thread: Japan War, Interesting Twist

  1. #1

    Join Date
    Jul 2011
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    Japan War, Interesting Twist

    In rereading the book, GET YAMAMOTO, I found an unexpected and interesting twist to the story.
    For those not familair, here' s brief summary"
    As hostilities grew more likely between Japan and U S before 1940, partly over U S restrictions on Japans access to middle east oil. Adm. Isokuro Yamamoto was the leading military commander for Japan. He had lived iin the U S and was even a student at Harvard for 2 years. Obvioulsy intelligent he also was a leader that men folloed. He may have liked the U S or at least respected our country, and as war became more likley he was one voice agianst the war. and had real dooubs about the outcome of an uneven contest between their small country and ours. Nevertheless, as a loyal soldier, he was a forward thinker and a main proponent of the surprise Pear Harbor attack. Decades before, he anticipated the importance of aircraft attackin from carriers.
    When ordered to begin the war he did so, and as he precicted, "run wild for 6 months to a year" while the Allies woke up.
    Anyway, the U S was able to intercept and decode Japan navy top secret messages and in 1943 they found one about him on an island tour. With only 4 days notice they intercepted him with long range P-38s and shot down the two bomber transports. He was known to be punctual. The planners took into account on who Japan might replace him with and decided no one else was in his class.
    The pilot who shot the Adm down may have been Tom Lamphier, A few years after the war, Lamphier stopped in Japan on a world wide airline publlcity tour and was surprised to be told that Yamamotos widow was there and wanted to meet him. Mrs. Yamamoto was formal but gracious, handed him flowers and said, "Welcome to Tokyo". Even more amazing was that her son was to be a student at Harvard. It was probably hard for him to understand how she felt, but in any case the war was over and now a former bitter enemy is an ally.
    Last edited by Bill Greenwood; 03-02-2017 at 08:54 PM.

  2. #2

    Join Date
    Aug 2016
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    102
    Fascinating info Bill- thanks for sharing it! This is new to me and as an avid WWII aviation history guy this is really neat to hear about! My grandpa had orders in hand to be transferred to the pacific theater but the bomb voided those. He was a flight surgeon in the 8th Air Force and ended up in a reconnaissance position liberating Luftwaffe Aerospace Medical equipment that we later used to win the space race. Thanks for sharing this and all your posts about historical events. So interesting for me to read about! Thanks!

  3. #3
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