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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)."
Unless you actually read a book or watched Discovery channel in the past 20 years. I've seen that on there tons of times. And I read a story about it in high school which was almost 6 years ago. Maybe little known if you only know a little?
The BBC (or it may have been Channel 4 in the UK) did a programme about these balloons, explaining how the Japanese used the Jet Stream, and a clockwork mechanism to drop sandbags allowing the balloon to drop out of the stream once over the States - I believe many ended up in Canada.
I heard about this in my world history classes in high school and college, in my Japanese history class (well no shit I'd hear about it there), and on several occasions since, and I've never once gone actively looking for this information.
I think it's more well-known than most minor elements of WWII.
... the pinnacle of the science of precision bombing. Can't really see it catching on.
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.
photos and more info here and an interesting photo of them being shot down from a plane.
Intersting stuff.
I saw a documentary about this as to why the AK-47 beats the M-16 in real combat. It basically came down the the fact that the M-16 was a rifle with autofire capabilities, while the AK-47 was a machine gun with rifle capabilities. The AK-47 worked much better in real combat, because it almost never jammed, and was quite easy to use, which is good if you don't have time to train soldiers. The AK-47 was also a lot heavier. Which allowed it to be used much more effectively at very close range. (AKA, using it to club the guy over the head)
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
I'm finding it hard to believe that this comment isn't a troll.
Either that or it displays a very real ignorence of the eithics of bombing during WWII.
WWII was an ugly war. Every nation involved did thing which were, then and now, considered unacceptable. Nations still do today. Unfortunatly many still operate on the principle that the end justifies the means. I think this is actually one of the tenents of Neoconservatisim.
May the Maths Be with you!
It was quite an engineering marvel, even if the results were sickening(to this day, parts of rural China will still periodically get outbreaks of the plague because of these weapons labs),
Yes, China and India still have plague outbreaks from time to time. But it's absurd to blame that on Japanese weapons of 50 years ago rather than the more obvious lack of sufficient sanitation in rural areas.
John McPhee wrote about this in The New Yorker, 29 January 1996, 52:60. It's a really neat story on how Geologists figured out where exactly in Japan the balloons were being produced based on the sand used in the ballast the ballons held to make the long float across the Pacific.
This is how we first learned about the jet stream as well.
I'm pretty sure the story is in Annals of the Former World, a 1996 book by McPhee, all about geeky geology stuff, but it's a really interesting read.
After the Rape of Nanking, its very hard to have any sympathy for any Japanese. [my emphasis]
Because all Japanese supported it? I was under the - apparently mistaken - impression that pre-war and wartime Japan was a dictatorship. Or is this another stunning example of generalising to avoid making real points?
This is where the serious fun begins.
Is this news not 60 years old?
Only by coincidence did the Yanks discover that the bombs really were coming from Japan. The sand used in the sandbags was analysed and turned out very unique. However, as the Americans had done a complete survey of Japan's beaches (your granddad's tax dollars at work), they were able to narrow it down to a sand composition at a single beach in Japan.
Curious, a couple planes were sent to investigate...
So until 1940-whatever... No idea the jet stream existed.
:wq
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.
Though this article was intended to demonstrate the dangers of wartime censorship, the actual history demonstrates a quite different viewpoint.
The ballon attack plan was never to cut power lines and blow up family picnics. The Japanese had been working for many years on the effective use of biological weapons, and had every intention of using them with the balloons once they had some idea of whether they were reaching the US. Blowing up picnics should have provided them immediate, specific targeting feedback through the US media - much better targeting intelligence than would have been provided by a bizarre outbreak of bubonic plague in the Pacific Northwest.
Slate's having compared this to burying memos and hiding prisoner abuse scandals, secrets that are kept solely to protect political interests rather than military ones, demonstrates not only a catastrophic failure to understand history, but further weakens the credibility of anyone speaking out against that very same modern politically driven censorship.
Nice going, Slate.
who are those slashdot people? they swept over like Mongol-Tartars.
The casualties are noteworthy because they're the only people killed inside the United States by a foreign military since the Brits burned DC in 1812. There was fighting in Alaska and (obviously) Hawaii during WWII, but they weren't states yet.
-B
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.
As one who has contributed significantly to the Wikipedia article on the War of 1812, I need to clarify this. It was the British forces, not Canadian militia, who landed in Maryland, defeated the DC militia at Bladensburg, burned the public buildings, and then moved to take Baltimore. At Baltimore the landing force was soundly defeated at North Point, and the ship force could not crack Ft. McHenry, so they withdrew.
The Canadian militia performed very well, but they, like the American militia, faced problems when dealting with regular soldiers. General Winfield Scott and Jacob Brown led a regular US column into Ontario in 1814, mauling both Canadian and British forces at Chippewa. The British victory at Lundy's Lane in July 1814 was due more to Scott and Brown's wounding and the horrific casualty rate on both sides. The American forces actually took the Canadian and British guns, but were too weak to stay. They then mauled the Canadian militia at Fort Erie, Ontario, and moved back over the Niagara, guaranteeing a stalemate in the Northern campaign.
The War of 1812 was one of those rare wars where both sides accomplished much of their war goals. The US did not annex Canada, but the gateway to the Southwest opened up, enabling us to move westward into Spanish/Mexican territory. The British began to give American positions more respect internationally, including a preference to negotiate agreements rather than fight. Canada became a nation, though Quebec and the Red River settlements were both problematic. There are reasons why both nations celebrate it as a victory, though technically it was a draw.
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