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Japanese Balloon Battle
mw2040 writes "Slate reports on a little-known method used by the Japanese during WWII - hydrogen-filled paper balloons with deadly payloads floated without a guidance-system across the Pacific. Both amazing low-tech warfare and a cautionary tale about censorship during wartime. More links (even one for our neighbors to the North) (shamelessly stolen from the article)."
Nothing wrong with censorship during a war for survival. First order of the day is always to survive.
One thing you will not find in Japanese schoolbooks is an historical account of the massacre at Nanking. In 1937, the Japanese attacked China and killed thousands of innocents in Nanking. Today, it's as if it never happened. In fact, I have never learned of this myself until very recently.
This kind of censorship is what we need to be aware of today. Historical records must not be skewed so that they may not tell all sides of the story - always make sure you know where your sources are coming from. This is one of the many reasons why history repeats itself.
To this end the Germans disassembled a light bomber, brought it to the arctic in a sub...put it together and tried to hit a munitions facility north of Minneapolis. It ran out of fuel and crashed within 10 miles of the suspected target. Imagine the psychological impact of a heartland attack like that.
Of course there is the well known U-boat activity from Florida to Maine. People living on the coast saw many instances of ship aflame.
When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.
The Canadian war museum, http://www.civilization.ca/cwm/cwme.asp has one on such captured balloon on display. They also have a map showing where each balloon landed. The source of the balloons were eventually tracked down by studying the sand they used for ballast - it had a unique composition particular to one area in Japan. From this information they were able to later able to pinpoint the location the factory and put it out of commission.
The Japanese were the first to discover the existance of the jet stream, and take advantage of it.
My rights don't need management.
Why do most mainstream news articles seem to censor themselves by giving us six paragraphs of patting one self ( the author that is) on the back and rhetorical questions before hitting the meat of the story?
About half way down the article they finally mention the balloon bombs but by that time I was already bored to death. Maybe the Japanese should have used dullard journalism on us... it would have been more effective.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
The war was a bit more substantial than we heard in the press regards domestic deaths. There were several locations where U-Boats shelled both costs, At Battery Park in New York is a monument to the war on the east coast with a name or two (Thousands) that were killed by German actions near or on shore.
These myths and the argument for security are just nuts. The internet has ended any such secrets. I do think some wisdom in presenting is in order but frankly the day of doing something secretly is OVER!
My parents witnessed one of the Jap bombs hit a hillside in S. San Francisco and set it ablaze. During the war much in the way of massive forrest damage was done by these bombs. My family includes parties who fought the fires.
All of this stuff is like the Bush Administration's current cry that "The story is just not getting out" on the rising economy. Well people get notice every week or two of the facts and it's called a paycheck. You can lie all you want but the paycheck tends to bring in the truth. Why do these people never get the story streight? Propaganda is not going to work for long. It matters little what Bush or Kerry says on the economy, the paychecks will carry the truth right to the door of the voters.
In the modern world not telling a story is often much more dangerous than telling it. This old way of thinking that secrets are valuable is generally just not useful.
I for example knew (by working in my garden and looking up into the sky seeing aircraft passing the local airport) at least 10 hours before US forces landed in Haiti recently and a good 24 hours before the media got the story. I told family at the time! Telling me that they were not going at that time would have made a liar or fool of the party trying to tell me otherwise.
The Russians who kept every secret well would not let any clues to their people about the Afghanistan situation out. Well the people got the bodies and death notices and were visited by comrads of the slain. The effect was much worse than just reporting the facts would have been. Americans are trying to run a Russian model here and it will not work. It will not even work in Russia.
Never Politically Correct ~ I prefer the facts If you don't like what I say, get a life, or comment yourself.