Through The Looking Glass
What a coincidence, I just bought the Victroy at Sea series on Ebay about a month ago. I too remember watching it alot when I was young. Copies should be distributed to every peacnik Anti war leftist, they should be strapped to a chair with toothpicks holding their eyes open and forced to watch the whole series.
Posted by Paul "No Fear" Weir
08/01/2006 at 07:00 PM
I just got Victory At Sea from my neighbor. He is remarkable in his own right, but his father, General Lebailey of USAAF/USAF-SAC, was very interesting.
Stories he told, and stories my neighbor heard, are astounding. Too bad so many are taken to the grave.
Gen. Lebailey flew over Holland during the time the Germans had embargoed all supplies because of the Dutch Resistance. The local German commanders did not like this policy. They made a deal with the Americans - if the Americans flew their bomber (B-24’s as i recall) low and slow, with bomb bays open, they could drop food and meds to the civilians, and the German flack crews would stand beside their guns arms folded. Sure enough, they flew in and the German crews stood around watching. They dropped supplies. Lebailey looked down and saw a guy on a rooftop running around with a Dutch flag waving and cheering. Sadly, the guy did not pay attention to where he was and ran right off the roof to his death.
Gen. Lebailey re-built the Japanese Air Force. At dinner one night was Mitsuo Fuchida, who led the attack on Peral Harbor; he died in 1976. Fucida tells of an event just after Pearl, when his forces had been pulled back to the Phillipines. His flight spotted a lone B-17; they attacked and it fought back but the Zeros were too much for it. the B-17 caught fire and fell into the clouds below. Fuchida regrouped the flight to head back to base, when suddenly the air was filled with bullets. Thinking they were under attack by American fighters, he looked around and saw the B-17, engulfed in flames, flying back up at them with the nose gunner blasting away! They scattered just as the B-17 became a total fireball. At that point, Fucida knew that, if this crew would fight back in that burning aircraft, Japan had made a very big mistake taking on the Americans.
Just two stores told by one guy. How many more are lost? Sad. Sad.
Regarding the photo, I wonder what the crews of the various ships in the carrier battle group did to note such a profound location? Were I a commander of a ship, I might consider a viewing of the VaS show on Iwo, or at least some sort of education for the crews on the battle. Imagine knowing this stuff, then seeing the very island! Leaders can take advantage of these sorts of events to create a teachable moment, and they should.
