Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aircraft and Vehicles => Topic started by: Cthulhu on September 30, 2014, 01:52:12 PM
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SOME INTERESTING HISTORICAL STUFF!!
Rare photos of a fascinating piece of history. This was overshadowed by the Tokyo Bay surrender ceremony a few weeks later. But what rare photos (and some personal descriptions of that event).
Interesting photos of the preparation of Surrender of Japan in August 1945.(Officially signed on the USS Missouri in the Tokyo Bay, September 2, 1945)A delegation of Japanese Representatives flew to an American Base close to Okinawa.The Japanese planes were requested to be painted in white and have the"Meatballs" replaced by a Green Cross.Really rare archives......Here are photographs of some of those Green Cross flights and Green Cross aircraft, starting with the most photographed of them all. the Green Cross Bettys of Iejima
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20J/Green%20Cross%20Flights/GreenCross57.jpg)
Let the surrender begin. B-25J Mitchell bombers of the 345th Bomb Group (The Apaches) lead two Green Cross Mitsubishi G4M Betty medium bombers into the island of Iejima (called Ie Shima by the Americans). The 345th Bomb Group (the 498th, 499th, 500th and 501st Squadrons) was based on Iejima and was given the task and the very special honour of escorting the Bettys from Tokyo to the rendezvous with United States Army Air Force C-54s, which would take the Japanese officers and envoys on to Manila to meet with no less than Douglas MacArthur himself. Photo: USAF
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20J/Green%20Cross%20Flights/GreenCross58.jpg)
The two Bettys (ironically and deliberately given the call signs Bataan 1 and Bataan 2 by the Americans) fly low over the East China Sea, inbound for Iejima wearing their hastily painted white surrender scheme and green crosses. One can only imagine what is going on in the conflicted minds of the Japanese airmen as they fly over their own territory in the company of the hated enemy, headed for an event of profound humiliation in front of thousands of enemy soldiers. These two Bettys would become the most photographed Green Cross surrender aircraft of the end of the war. Photo: US Navy
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20J/Green%20Cross%20Flights/GreenCross43.jpg)
A photograph taken from the same 345th Bomb Group Mitchell that is depicted in the first photograph, looking back at another B-25 Mitchell and a B-17. Above, P-38 Lightnings provide top cover. The top cover was needed because some Japanese officials had ordered the remnants of the Japanese Army Air Force to attack and bring down their own bombers rather than surrender. Instead of flying directly to Iejima, the two Japanese planes flew northeast, toward the open ocean, to avoid their own fighters. Photo
viawarbirdinformationexchange .org
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20J/Green%20Cross%20Flights/GreenCross44.jpg)
The Betty was officially known as the Type-1 land-based attack aircraft, but to its Japanese Navy crews, it was lovingly known as the Hamaki (Cigar), the reason for which is obvious in this photograph (also because one could light it up fairly easily). The Betty was a good performer, but it was often employed in low level, slow speed operations such as torpedo attacks and it had a tendency to explode into flames when hit by even light enemy fire, leading some unhappy pilots to call them the Type One Lighter or The Flying Lighter. We can clearly see that the Betty’s traditional armament, nose, tail, waist and dorsal guns, have been removed as demanded by the Americans. The B-17 in the distance is from 5th Air Force, 6th Emergency Rescue Squadron carrying a type A-1 lifeboat. The A-1 was dropped by parachute and was motorized. It seems that American authorities did not want to lose these men in the event of a ditching. Photo
viawarbirdinformationexchange .org
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20J/Green%20Cross%20Flights/GreenCross23.jpg)
As thousands of American soldiers, airmen, sailors, dignitaries and press photographers on the island of Iejima look to the sky, the two 345th Bomb Group B-25J Mitchells escort the two white Green Cross Bettys over the airfield before
setting up for a landing. Photo: James Chastain, 36 Photo Recon Squadron
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20J/Green%20Cross%20Flights/GreenCross41.jpg)
As thousands of suspicious, curious and anxious young men look on, the Japanese pilot brings his Mitsubishi Betty down on to the bleached coral airfield of Iejima. Note the all-metal Douglas C-54 waiting for their arrival. Photo via Pinterest
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20J/Green%20Cross%20Flights/GreenCross01.jpg)
It is plainly obvious that in August of 1945, on the island if Iejima, it was brutally hot the day the Green Cross Bettys landed. Here one of the two aircraft drops on to the runway as soldiers, the formal welcoming committee and pressmen wait, finding shade where they could. Photo: U.S. Naval Historical Center The second of the two Green Cross Bettys makes its final approach while press photographers and reporters capture the long-awaited moment. Photo: James Chastain, 36 Photo Recon Squadron
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20J/Green%20Cross%20Flights/GreenCross70.jpg)
As the second Betty alights on the coral airstrip, every eye on the island is trained on them. One cannot even imagine what this scene looked like to these Japanese as they looked out from the aircraft windows at a sea of mistrust and a
new, grim reality.Photo: James Chastain, 36 Photo Recon Squadron
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20J/Green%20Cross%20Flights/GreenCross81.jpg)
Another view taken farther back at Iejima shows the two massive and beautifully kept Douglas C-54 aircraft waiting for the passengers of the landing Betty. Image viawwiivehicles.com
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20J/Green%20Cross%20Flights/GreenCross34.jpg)
With its clamshell canopy open and her Captain standing up to direct his co-pilot through the crowd, the first Green Cross Betty to land at Iejima taxis past a seemingly endless line of enemy soldiers. The scene is one of abject humiliation and intimidation. That pilot must surely have felt the mistrust of the thousands of pairs of eyes burning
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