The Sub That Saved Two Presidencies

[Halo]

If George H.W. Bush had parachuted down on Chichi Jima instead of just far enough from it for a submarine to rescue him, the United States might never have had two Bush presidencies.

Eight other U.S. Navy and Marine pilots and aircrew were taken prisoner on Chichi Jima. a vital radio communications link for Japan in WWII.  Most were killed, and some even had parts of their bodies eaten by their Japanese captors -- atrocities kept secret from the world public for decades.

With remarkable balancing of global culture clashes and individuals swept up in events they little understood, James Bradley reports on these often horrific events in his second book, Flyboys (Little, Brown and Company, 2003).  

His first book was the best seller Flags of Our Fathers, inspired by his father being among the Marines raising the U.S. flag on Iwo Jima after the battle that caused the most U.S. Navy and Marine casualties in history.

The United States and Japan were more different and yet more alike than either imagined before and after WWII.  Flyboys concludes with a moving account of former President Bush visiting Chichi Jima with the author and meeting one of the Japanese soldiers who treated the American prisoners kindly but could not save them.

Flyboys is a masterpiece of examining how governments and citizens try to cope with their perceptions of what is right and wrong in the world and among themselves.  Check it out from your library and see for yourself.

[dogsnot]

was a great book Halo, really made you think how closed societies form perceptions of others right or wrong.  The book once again made me thankful for the men who fought and died to save my family from a fate too gruesome to think about.

snot

[DmdBT]

What ever happened to Bush's crew? The TBM had a regular crew of 3 men if I'm not mistaken.

[Halo]

One of Bush's buddies, Ted White, was the ordnance officer for the squadron but asked Bush to go along on this strike as turret gunner.  The third crewman was radioman John Delaney.  

At 20 years old, George Bush was the youngest pilot in the squadron, but already had been flying in the Pacific for almost five months.  

Bush's Avenger was hit by flak on his dive, but he continued the run and dropped the bombs.  After the run Bush told White and Delaney to bail out  

Then Bush finally bailed out, coming down in the ocean about four miles northeast of Chichi Jima.  

Bush didn't know it, but witnesses later said only two chutes came out of the plane.  One was Bush; nobody ever knew who the other chute carried.  

Neither White nor Delaney survived.  

Japanese on Chichi Jima saw Bush land in the water, and sent out small boats to capture him.  But some of Bush's buddies strafed them and they turned back.

Bush's flight leader radioed the submarine USS Finback, which had been standing by for such an emergency.  Three hours and 13 minutes later the sub rescued Bush.

Some 50 years later, former President Bush asked the author of Flyboys if he had any new information about his two crewmen.  The author, James Bradley, didn't.  

Bradley reported Bush said, "I think about those guys all the time," still worried that he might not have given them enough time to bail out.  Survivor's guilt, which many veterans experience.

Read Flyboys.  It really is a great book.

[MadMan]

Amzing how a war hero didn't get his second term in office, but rather lost the election to a draft dodger who later proved to be (but not for some reason never punished for) guilty of perjury.

[Paul33]

It was pretty disgusting what the Japaneese did throught the war. I had no idea that happened until I read the book. Wow.

[Rafe35]

I believe I still remember about the pilot (I think he was Indian-American) who was flying F4U-1D and later crash in some island near Iwo Jima? and was killed by Japanese and I think they cut his head off.

[Hyrax81st]

The American-Indian was a Texan of the Cherokee tribe named Warren (I think). He was the one befriended by the American-Japanese soldier (Hawaiian-born of Japanese ancestry who was caught in Tokyo when war broke out and pressed into military service) who Bush-41 met on Chichi Jima years later.

It's an incredible book. The most startling fact revealed to me which I never knew was that the Japanese Army staff knew NOTHING of the defeat of the Japanese navy at Midway until after the war was over.  The army thought the IJN was out there patrolling the pacific with their fleets when they were basically on the defensive the rest of the war.

Talk about compartmentalization of military information...sheesh !

By the way... go see "Fog of War" documentary of Robert McNamara for an interesting view into his experience with Curtis LeMay and the firebombing of Tokyo.

[_Schadenfreude_]

Originally posted by MadMan
Amzing how a war hero didn't get his second term in office, but rather lost the election to a draft dodger who later proved to be (but not for some reason never punished for) guilty of perjury.

Apparently the economy had something to do with it....

[eilif]

World War II A Photographic History is a great book, its about 600 pages long, more than half of it is pictures! I learned here of the horrific Japanese, as well as the allies crimes of humanity. Makes you wonder who the true villains of the war were,  at one point in the war after the fire bombing on Germany Churchil was quoted saying "are we monsters". I was really amazed to find that when we asked the Japanese to surrender, they responded with a "no coment". It was transulated as no, then we droped the nuke.  There is significant evidence that says they were in the process of surrendering. How couldnt they be! But the fact that a transulation error had so much of an effect it hurendouse.

[eilif]

if it was in fact an error...