The date is 1944, and the war in Europe has finally begun to turn against Nazi Germany.
Over in the Pacific, the United States has also finally turned the tide against the Japanese
onslaught across the South Pacific region, and a bloody island hopping campaign has driven
the Japanese closer and closer to home.
The empire of the rising sun however still has a stranglehold on China, and as long as
they do they'll be able to continue feeding the homelands with vital war supplies.
The US Army has been largely responsible for aiding the Chinese war against the Japanese,
though American ground forces are few on the ground.
Instead millions of tons of supplies stream steadily into China, courtesy of the United
States, as the Chinese people fight to reclaim their conquered homeland.
The US Army's Air Corps however can make a much more significant contribution to the
war effort here in China, thanks to several airfields hastily constructed by the Chinese
people.
Strung along these rough dirt airfields are right now several columns of shiny new aircraft,
all emblazoned with the logo of the US Army Air Corps.
These aircraft represent the state of the art for modern bomber design, and are the
culmination of a top secret bomber program began by the United States even before the
war began.
At almost twice the cost of the Manhattan Project which would eventually produce the
atomic bomb, it is also the most expensive weapons program of all World War II.
Four engines roar to life on each aircraft.
Their designation is the B-29, the older brother of the B-17 Flying Fortress.
Her crews call her the Superfortress, and not without reason.
These massive beasts are outfitted with thick armor plating, are nearly 100 feet long (30
meters), with a wingspan of 141 feet (44 meters).
Four turbosupercharged engines, amongst the most powerful in the world, deliver a whopping
2,200 horsepower each, making the big planes capable of lifting up to 120,000 lbs (54431
kg) to a height of nearly 34,000 feet.
The Superfortress flies so high, and so far- with a range of 3,250 miles (5230 km)- that
it's impossible to provide it with a fighter escort.
That doesn't bother the crews of the big planes much though, as they are more than capable
of defending themselves thanks to twelve fifty caliber machine guns that ring the aircraft.
The name 'Superfortress' is definitely well earned.
More engines roar to life as eighty eight superfortresses prepare for takeoff.
The sound is almost unbearable, an incredible cacophony of war roaring to life as the planes
begin to taxi and then lift up into the air.
Each aircraft carries 20,000 pounds of bombs (9072 kgs), and yet the four powerful engines
have no problem lifting the giant planes into the air.
Today, the planes aren't headed to bomb japanese targets on the mainland.
They're going after the much bigger prize that only these state of the art planes can
hit- they're going after the Japanese islands themselves.
The Japanese struck Pearl Harbor, sovereign American territory, with impunity, and have
been striking deep into the many nations of the South Pacific for years.
Now, the US returns the favor, and the untouchable Japanese are finally learning the consequences
of their actions.
War has finally come home to Japan.
The planes plot a course east towards the Pacific.
Towards the end of the 1930s, the US Army identified the B-17 as the primary bomber
for any war in Europe against Nazi Germany, but hostilities with Japan had long been simmering.
For the vast expanses of the Pacific theater, the B17 simply wouldn't do, and thus the B29
project was fast tracked.
One of the top requirements for the B29 would be the ability to fly far and hit hard when
it got there, and one of the keys to executing that mission successfully was the ability
to fly extremely high.
At higher altitudes planes could fly more efficiently, and thus use less gas which increased
their range.
However, the B29 was designed to fly higher than any other bomber before it, so high in
fact that enemy fighters would never reach it.
Fully loaded each B29 could reach nearly 34,000 feet, which put it just above the maximum
ceiling for most of the Axis power's fighters.
However flying so high presented a whole slew of new problems for the crew, and in order
to preserve the ability for the 11 man crew to fly long endurance missions, the B29 made
a revolutionary change: it would have completely pressurized and climate controlled crew spaces.
As the planes fly east, the crew settles into their compartments.
The pressurized compartments are far more comfortable than the freezing cold crew spaces
of the B-17 and other bombers, and means that the crew doesn't have to constantly wear bulky
and restrictive oxygen masks.
For the men that fly these state of the art bombers on missions that can be over twelve
hours long, the pressurized compartments are a godsend.
By flying east the B29s avoid many of the ground-based Japanese fighter bases.
While the B29s are flying high enough that fighters are more a nuisance than a threat,
ground anti-air artillery is still capable of reaching their cruising altitude, and there'll
be plenty of it to face over the Japanese home islands.
No sense in giving the enemy more target practice than necessary.
A few hours into the flight, the planes turn north, with a slight eastern heading.
From here on out it's a straight shot to the home islands.
Incredibly the route is largely undefended, even now Japanese carriers are fighting a
losing war against the American navy, and very quickly becoming a rapidly diminishing
resource.
Any japanese destroyers or cruisers which might threaten the bombers with anti-air artillery
are busy fighting a joint Australian and American force around the Philippines.
Plus the constant pressure from American subs has taken a huge toll on the Japanese surface
fleet.
Soon, the planes are approaching the Japanese island of Kyushu.
Their target lies on the main island of Honshu- the decision to strike deeper in Japanese
territory is not only riskier, but also meant to drive the message home to the Japanese
people: the war has turned against you, and you are no longer safe on your island.
Still, it is a risky move.
Overflying the city of Fukuoka, Japanese Zeros are the first to respond.
The planes are surprisingly quick and agile, at the start of the war they were the best
fighters in the world and absolutely decimated allied pilots with a whopping 12 to 1 kill
ratio.
However, soon Allied designs caught up and then surpassed those of Japanese engineers,
and the Zero now is more a liability than a threat against modern American and British
fighters.
That however doesn't make it any less deadly against big, lumbering bombers.
The Zeros zoom up into the sky, pulling into almost vertical ascents as they close the
distance to the flock of American bombers.
The pilots are clearly inexperienced- though a direct ascent seems the fastest and shortest
route to their target, the B29s are flying so high, just over the Zero's maximum ceiling,
that the planes quickly stall out and lose power in the steep ascent.
A more experienced pilot would've flown a much more gradual ascent, though in truth,
this would still have left him with little time to engage the B29s before also losing
power and stalling out.
The B29s simply fly too high to be threatened for long by the Japanese fighters- but some
of the planes are experiencing various mechanical issues.
The B29s is so new that not all of its bugs have been worked out.
These planes are forced to fly lower than normal, and are definitely in range of the
incoming Zeroes.
Aboard a low-flying B29, the defensive turret gunners quickly get to work.
Unlike a normal bomber aircraft, these gunners don't manually fire their guns from behind
a thick glass bubble, instead they rely on a state of the art fire control system that
remotely links the guns to sighting stations all around the plane.
The gunners are thus able to remain in the pressurized spaces and still fire guns placed
anywhere on the plane
Soon 12 machine guns are filling the sky around the B29 with .50 caliber bullets.
Each gunner can operate multiple turrets at the same time, allowing the gunner with the
best vantage point to create deadly crossfires.
A Japanese zero strays too close and finds itself in the midst of one of these crossfires,
the big .50 caliber rounds chewing the fighter to pieces.
Another zero however approaches from behind, but is spotted by the rear gunner.
Twin machine guns open up just as the Zero itself fires on the B29.
Thick armor plating on the rear of the bomber deflects most of the Zero's rounds, with a
few managing to cause mostly superficial damage.
Up against dual .50 caliber machine guns though, the Zero doesn't press the attack and quickly
breaks off to overfly the bomber.
This however, is a fatal mistake.
Quickly shifting his control on the fly, the rear gunner slaves the rear upper gun turret
to his fire control system, and creates a sheet of lead that the Zero flies directly
into.
Machine gun rounds punch through the relatively light armor plating of the Zero, and completely
shear off the left wing.
The stricken fighter tumbles out of the sky in a rapid gyrating pattern- the pilot will
never be able to overcome the centrifugal force and leap to safety with his parachute...
although rumors are that the Japanese pilots refuse to wear parachutes anyways.
Something about it being cowardly for a warrior to flee certain death.
On board the B29, the Americans happily keep their parachutes at arm's length.
The B29's thick armor has spared it the worst of the damage from attacking Zeros, but some
of her hydraulic systems have been hit.
Redundant systems allow the pilot to keep control over the aircraft, but concerned the
plane may experience further mechanical failures, the pilot makes the decision to abort.
The rest of the formation, safely above the Zero's ability to effectively engage them,
continues on to the main Japanese island.
As the B29s approach their targets, Japanese air artillery begins to open up, filling the
sky with plumes of black smoke.
That's the telltale sign of exploding anti-aircraft shells, and unlike Japanese zeroes, these
can easily reach the cruising altitude of a B29.
The crews buckle themselves into their seats, parachutes now on their backs- just in case.
Aboard the lead B29, the pilot and co-pilot watch the black puffs of smoke far below their
position.
The Japanese still haven't sighted in on the extreme altitude of these new American bombers,
but it doesn't take them long to adjust.
A few minutes later, the black puffs of smoke are now appearing all around the bombers.
On the lead aircraft, the crew winces as they hear the sound of shrapnel peppering the metal
skin of their plane.
Once more they are thankful for the thick armor plating.
Another bomber however isn't so lucky.
Already stressed by on-the-fly design modifications of the engines, which have a tendency to overheat
and catch fire, one of its engines abruptly stalls out and starts spewing thick, black
smoke.
A round has exploded too near to it and showered the engine with shrapnel, shredding the delicate
mechanical components.
On the wing of the aircraft another round has punctured the plane's wing and torn into
the fuel tank there, although thankfully the self-sealing tank is doing a good job of preventing
a catastrophic loss of fuel.
Like its counterpart earlier though, this B29 is forced to abort.
Others will soon follow, though one will never get a chance to.
A Japanese round manages to score a direct hit on the cockpit, blowing out the entire
forward crew compartment.
Despite the total obliteration of the forward cabin, the plane manages to fly mostly level
and straight for a few moments on its own power, but soon wind resistance causes the
plane to dip, and suddenly completely flip.
The violent maneuver proves too stressful for the airframe and the massive plane is
torn apart in mid-air, the surviving crew inside trapped and unable to jump out as it
tumbles out of the sky to the ground below.
The rest of the formation presses on however, and soon, the weapons officer on the lead
plane gives a brief announcement.
Sighting down on the ground below through a highly classified and extremely accurate
bomb sight, the weapons officer orders a release, and the massive weapons bay doors swing open.
In moments, forty 500 pound bombs begin to tumble out of the aircraft.
Cued on by their lead in the formation, the rest of the B29s quickly follow suit.
This is carpet bombing on a massive scale, and the surviving 76 aircraft formation drops
a whopping 3,040 bombs on the Japanese industrial city below.
689 tons of explosives rain down on the population, and while the extreme height and wind resistance
blows many bombs off course, so many explosives are falling out of the sky that it largely
doesn't matter.
The industrial sector is absolutely decimated, though stray bombs kill many civilians as
well and destroy countless homes.
For the survivors of the massive B29 raid, it is finally starting to sink in that this
new plane has brought war home to Japan.
Wanna hear more war stories about incredible planes?
Then check out our episode World War 3 Airplane: E-6 Mercury!
Or perhaps you'd enjoy this other video over here instead.
Either way, click one now, because fun has come home to you today!