When the United States entered World War II it engaged in a two front war with enemies on opposite sides of the globe. Decisions had to be made regarding how to fight the war. Military strategists concluded the best course of action was to focus on Germany and Italy first and Japan second. By the time Japan attacked Pearl Harbor France had fallen to German and Great Britain was constantly under attack. If Britain were to fall it would be far easier for Germany to attack North America across the Atlantic than for Japan to do so across the Pacific (although the Japanese did have a small base in the Aleutian Islands). This didn't mean the war in the Pacific would be put on hold until the Nazis were defeated, just that the focus would be on North Africa and Europe until the Axis powers where conquered.
Fighting the Japanese brought its own challenges. To the east Korea and much of the Chinese coast had already been conquered by Japan. To the north the Soviet Union had chosen to remain neutral to Japan and could not be considered an ally in this fight. From the west and south Japan was simply insulated by hundreds of miles of ocean with many islands under its Imperial control and a powerful naval fleet at its command. There was simply no way to bring the war to the Japanese home islands in 1941.
The U.S. did attempt to do this in April 1942 when Lt. Col. James Doolittle bombed Tokyo and four other cities with 16 B-25 Mitchells launched from the U.S.S. Hornet, a Navy aircraft carrier. The B-25 was not designed to take off fomr the deck of a carrier. As the carrier fleet approached Japan they were spotted by a Japanese picket boat. With the element of surprise lost Doolittle decided to launch immediately. This choice added about 600 miles to the mission.
The plan was to bomb military targets in Japan and then fly over Japanese occupied China and land deeper in the Chinese mainland which was still under Chinese control (and friendly to the U.S.). The added distance to the trip and deteriorating weather over Japan made this impossible to accomplish. All 16 bombers crashed, and 11 of the 80 crewmen participating in the raid were either killed or captured. The remaining 69 crewmen eventually made it to friendly territory and safety. Many of these men were aided by a few local Chinese villagers. The Japanese responded by killing thousands of Chinese because a few showed this kindness to the American airmen.
This raid, while it didn't cause much damage to targets in Japan, was a huge boost for morale in the United States. However, the strategy of bombing Japan from aircraft carriers simply wasn't feasible. Several things were very obvious to the military strategists.
- Any bombing campaign launched against Japan would have to be accomplished by land based bombers.
- The U.S. would have to secure land deep inside Japanese controlled territory to accomplish this goal.
- A new long range bomber would need to be developed to help accomplish this goal sooner.
All these things did happen through the U.S. campaign to take over islands in the South Pacific under Japanese control (known as "island hopping") and the development of the B-29 Superfortress, but it would be over 2.5 years before another American bomber would attack Tokyo. Meanwhile, American troops would cut their teeth against the Axis powers in North Africa before moving on to Italy, France, and eventually Germany.
Related Articles
- U.S. Involvement in the War
- Fighting on Two Fronts
- Island Hopping
- Bombing Raids against Japan
- The End of the War
Additional Resources
- Visit the Doolitte Raiders official site.
- The Doolittle Raiders' story is documented in The War on page 43 (see book information on the books resources page).
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