Tokyo, April 18th, 1942.
A clear and quiet morning.
It’s the 133rd day of Japan’s war with the United States.
Just another day in Japan’s capital city far away from war.
Tokyo is staging another air raid drill
but no air raid sirens are sounded,
there is no panic, there is no rush.
Air raid wardens gaze and look into the placid and empty sky,
like they have done so many times before.
The drill comes to its predictable and uneventful end.
War workers put down their tools and begin their midday break.
Millions of other Tokyo residents go shopping,
order lunch in the busy restaurants,
visit parks and shrines,
and watch baseball games.
Although their nation is now at war,
a world war,
Tokyo’s citizens have reason enough to feel secure.
Radio Tokyo has repeatedly assured the population that they, their nation
and most importantly Emperor Hirohito are safe from enemy attack.
The fact is that no foreign attacker had seriously threatened Japan’s sacred soil
since Kublai Khan in 1281.
“Victory fever” is deeply felt by the populace.
Meanwhile, somewhere in the Pacific, American aircraft carriers Enterprise and Hornet
are part of a task force of 14 warships
heading to Japan for a seemingly impossible mission.
America is outraged and has been humbled.
The battleships of its Pacific Fleet are being salvaged and repaired in Pearl Harbor,
victims of the Japanese surprise attack of December 7th, 1941.
Over the following months the U.S. and its allies could only stand by and watch
as the Japanese juggernaut stormed across the Pacific,
paralysing every British, Dutch, French and American position in its path.
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The Hornet is the star of the show,
as it carries 16 medium B-25 bombers,
led by legendary pilot Lt Col James ‘Jimmy’ H. Doolittle.
Their mission is to avenge Pearl Harbor and strike at the heart of mainland Japan.
President Roosevelt himself has pressed all service chiefs to come up with a plan
to retaliate against Tokyo.
And they’ve delivered an idea so simple and daring
that no one has tried it before:
bombers from an aircraft carrier positioned hundreds of miles off the coast of Japan.
If it works, the bombers will hit at strategic targets
and if all goes to plan, to go on to land on the Chuchow airstrip
as agreed with the Chinese.
Jimmy Doolittle has been tasked with testing the bombers and training the crews,
a man with unflinching courage and living up to their motto
"Toujours Au Danger" — Ever into Danger,
Doolittle wants to be the first to take off from the Hornet to lead from the front.
But is it too late?
They get word that a scout plane has sighted several enemy vessels
which means the Japanese are about to spot the American task force.
At 7:38 am lookouts on the Hornet spot a small enemy patrol boat, the Nitto Maru.
They've been discovered.
The Hornet is still 300 miles and 9 hours of sailing away from the intended take off point.
Doolittle takes a snap decision.
It’s now or never.
He knows his crews won’t have enough fuel to reach the safety of Chuchow
and he knows all too well that he and his men may never return
but he can’t abort the mission.
Doolittle told his men: “I don’t intend to be taken prisoner,
I’m 45 years old and have lived a full life.
If my plane is crippled beyond any possibility of fighting or escape,
I’m going to have my crew bail out
and then I’m going to dive my B-25 into the best military target I can find.
You fellows are all younger and you have a long life ahead of you.
I don’t expect any of the rest of you to do what I intend to do.”
At 8:15 am Doolittle leads the way, and he is the first to be airborne.
At intervals of 1 to 5 minutes all B-25s leave the deck of the Hornet,
each carrying 5 crew members and four 500-pound bombs.
A few minutes later, the squadron is flying undisturbed,
barely forty feet above the water at a speed of 150 miles an hour.
Doolittle and nine other aircraft will strike at Tokyo.
Three B-25s will hit targets in Kanagawa, Yokohama, and the Yokosuka Navy Yard.
The remaining three will head to Nagoya, Osaka and Kobe.
At noon the unsuspecting citizens of Tokyo wave enthusiastically to the bombers flying past.
But then someone notices the distinctive white star painted on the planes
and realises the unthinkable is happening:
the Americans are attacking!
A French journalist rushed outside.
“I heard a rugged, powerful sound of airplane engines.
A raid at noon! Explosions.
I spotted a dark airplane traveling very fast at rooftop level.
So they’ve come!”, he said.
Doolittle climbs to 1,200 feet to avoid incoming anti-aircraft fire,
then locks onto his targets.
At 1:15 pm he gives the go ahead to his bombardier.
The bomb-bay doors open, and four incendiary cluster bombs plummet down over Tokyo.
As a firestorm engulfs Doolittle’s quarry.
He takes his plane down to rooftop level and veers south, back towards the Pacific.
He later said: “Down to the surface we went, mouths like glue, eyes wide open.”
At the same time Lt Joyce’s crew is in serious trouble.
They are being pursued by six Japanese fighters
and the pilot has to dive at high speed to elude them.
The manoeuvre causes both tail guns to jam,
leaving the B-25 defenceless.
In the heat of battle somehow Sgt Larkin manages to fix one of the machine guns.
He gets off several bursts.
It’s a hit and the Japanese fighter goes down.
Then another comes in and once more Larkin takes it down.
Larkin has saved the day and the bomber climbs above the clouds
leaving the remaining fighters behind.
Among other targets the Doolittle raiders have hit the Communication Ministry,
the Asahi Electrical Manufacturing factory,
the Japan Diesel and Steel corporations
and the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries aircraft factory.
The attack on the Yokosuka Naval Base has put an aircraft carrier out of action for what will be four months.
The mission is not over yet.
The raiders now have to make it to the safety of the Chuchow airstrips,
but everybody’s fuel is running dangerously low.
On top of that the agreed radio homing signals have not been activated.
Unbeknownst to the raiders the plane intended to deliver the radio beacons has taken off too late
and later crashes in a storm.
With few options available most crews decide to bail out.
At 9:30 pm Doolittle switches on the auto pilot and orders his crew to jump.
At about the same time Joyce, Larkin and their fellow crew members
don their parachutes and bail out of their planes.
A few minutes later Doolittle lands chest-deep into a rice paddy.
Alone in the dark he ventures into a farm to find shelter for the night.
The morning after Chinese guerrilla fighters help him link up with his crew.
Sgt Larkin however is not so lucky.
He has to hike for miles and climb two mountains
before he is reunited with the airmen from another bomber thanks to two missionaries.
Little by little with help from farmers, guerrillas and other missionaries
Doolittle and 54 of the raiders are successfully reunited.
Not all the crews are so lucky.
One plane has landed in Vladivostok.
The unfortunate crew are interned by the Soviets until they escape.
Three airmen have died in crash landings and eight have been captured by the Japanese.
Three of them will be executed and a fourth will die in captivity.
Lt Col Doolittle expects to be court-martialed and interned upon return to the US
due to the loss of all airplanes and his perceived low level of damage inflicted during the raid.
But the action is seen as a daring and incredible success
to reclaim the honor of America after the attack at Pearl Harbor.
The daring pilot is promoted to Brigadier General
and receives the Medal of Honor from President Roosevelt.
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