The Fog of War

everybody would laugh and go on. 456 00:32:57,343 --> 00:32:59,845 We were supposed to take these B-29s-- 457 00:32:59,911 --> 00:33:01,880 There were no tanker aircraft there. 458 00:33:01,947 --> 00:33:03,749 We were to fill them with fuel, 459 00:33:03,815 --> 00:33:06,152 fly from India to Chengdu, 460 00:33:06,218 --> 00:33:07,686 offload the fuel, fly back to India, 461 00:33:07,753 --> 00:33:11,823 make enough missions to build up fuel in Chengdu, 462 00:33:11,890 --> 00:33:14,726 fly to Yawata, Japan, bomb the steel mills 463 00:33:14,793 --> 00:33:16,595 and go back to India. 464 00:33:18,164 --> 00:33:20,632 We had so little training on this problem 465 00:33:20,699 --> 00:33:22,501 of maximizing efficiency, 466 00:33:22,568 --> 00:33:25,371 we actually found, to get some of the B-29s back 467 00:33:25,437 --> 00:33:28,940 instead of offloading fuel, they had to take it on. 468 00:33:31,910 --> 00:33:36,048 To make a long story short, it wasn't worth a damn. 469 00:33:36,115 --> 00:33:37,983 And it was LeMay who really 470 00:33:38,050 --> 00:33:40,086 came to that conclusion and led the chiefs 471 00:33:40,152 --> 00:33:41,987 to move the whole thing to the Marianas, 472 00:33:42,054 --> 00:33:44,256 which devastated Japan. 473 00:34:27,366 --> 00:34:31,002 LeMay was focused on only one thing: 474 00:34:32,204 --> 00:34:34,506 Target destruction. 475 00:34:36,007 --> 00:34:37,976 Most Air Force generals could tell you 476 00:34:38,043 --> 00:34:39,445 how many planes they had, 477 00:34:39,511 --> 00:34:40,979 how many tons of bombs they dropped, 478 00:34:41,046 --> 00:34:42,214 or whatever the hell it was. 479 00:34:42,281 --> 00:34:44,650 But he was the only person that I knew 480 00:34:44,716 --> 00:34:48,019 in the senior command in the Air Force who focused solely 481 00:34:48,086 --> 00:34:52,591 on the loss of his crews per unit of target destruction. 482 00:34:56,862 --> 00:34:59,831 I was on the island of Guam, in his command, 483 00:34:59,898 --> 00:35:03,034 in March of 1945. 484 00:35:04,503 --> 00:35:08,507 In that single night, we burned to death 485 00:35:08,574 --> 00:35:12,211 100,000 Japanese civilians in Tokyo. 486 00:35:12,278 --> 00:35:14,346 Men, women and children. 487 00:35:18,083 --> 00:35:21,153 MORRIS: Were you aware this was going to happen? 488 00:35:22,588 --> 00:35:25,157 Well, I was-- 489 00:35:25,224 --> 00:35:29,861 I was part of a mechanism that, in a sense, recommended it. 490 00:35:44,476 --> 00:35:47,279 I analyzed bombing operations, 491 00:35:47,346 --> 00:35:49,315 and how to make them more efficient, 492 00:35:49,381 --> 00:35:52,451 i.e., not more efficient in the sense of killing more, 493 00:35:52,518 --> 00:35:56,355 but more efficient in weakening the adversary. 494 00:35:59,758 --> 00:36:03,229 I wrote one report analyzing 495 00:36:03,295 --> 00:36:07,666 the efficiency of the B-29 operations. 496 00:36:07,733 --> 00:36:10,369 The B-29 could get above the fighter aircraft 497 00:36:10,436 --> 00:36:11,870 and above the air defense, 498 00:36:11,937 --> 00:36:14,540 so the loss rate would be much less. 499 00:36:14,606 --> 00:36:16,208 The problem was... 500 00:36:16,275 --> 00:36:18,310 the accuracy was also much less. 501 00:36:29,621 --> 00:36:32,924 Now, I don't want to suggest that it was my report 502 00:36:32,991 --> 00:36:36,362 that led to-- I'll call it the firebombing. 503 00:36:38,797 --> 00:36:40,899 It isn't that I'm trying to absolve myself 504 00:36:40,966 --> 00:36:42,434 of blame for the firebombing. 505 00:36:42,501 --> 00:36:44,636 I don't want to suggest that it was I... 506 00:36:44,703 --> 00:36:46,772 that put in LeMay's mind 507 00:36:46,838 --> 00:36:50,075 that his operations were totally inefficient, 508 00:36:50,141 --> 00:36:51,810 and had to be drastically changed. 509 00:36:51,877 --> 00:36:54,546 But, anyhow, that's what he did. 510 00:36:54,613 --> 00:36:59,851 He took the B-29s down to 5000 feet 511 00:36:59,918 --> 00:37:03,422 and he decided to bomb with firebombs. 512 00:37:21,573 --> 00:37:23,575 I participated in the interrogation 513 00:37:23,642 --> 00:37:27,813 of the B-29 bomber crews that came back that night. 514 00:37:27,879 --> 00:37:32,451 A room full of crewmen and intelligence interrogators. 515 00:37:32,518 --> 00:37:34,520 A captain got up, a young captain said: 516 00:37:34,586 --> 00:37:37,723 "Goddamn it, I'd like to know who the son of a bitch was 517 00:37:37,789 --> 00:37:39,825 "that took this magnificent airplane, 518 00:37:39,891 --> 00:37:42,728 "designed to bomb from 23, 000 feet 519 00:37:42,794 --> 00:37:46,565 "and he took it down to 5000 feet, and I lost my wingman. 520 00:37:46,632 --> 00:37:48,400 He was shot and killed." 521 00:37:50,268 --> 00:37:52,904 LeMay spoke in monosyllables. 522 00:37:52,971 --> 00:37:54,940 I never heard him say 523 00:37:55,006 --> 00:37:57,443 more than two words in sequence. 524 00:37:57,509 -->