PART IX: THE PACIFIC
WAR
JAPS SHOOT DOWN BRITISH ZEP
CALCUTTA, JUNE 6- British
officials in India have confirmed that the Imperial Japanese Navy shot down the
R106 Botany Bay, which was in route
to London after leaving Sydney on June 3. The Royal Navy received a radio
distress call from the R106 on the 4th, just hours after the attack
on Hong Kong and dispatched a search and rescue team to it’s last reported
coordinates. The Navy stated in a
press release today that all the team discovered was a small amount of floating
wreckage and a handful of bodies. There are no reported survivors of the 95
passengers or 47-member crew.
-“Japs Shoot Down British Zep,” The LA Times. June 7, 1944
JAPS TAKE HONG KONG
SYDNEY, JUNE 11- Japan has fully overrun the island of Hong
Kong, with the last of British forces pulling out of the area yesterday. The
island’s garrison suffered horrific damage during the surprise attack on June
4. Since the initial attack, British forces have been under constant siege with
high military and civilian casualties.
With Japan now having full control
of Hong Kong, the great powers that have control of other islands in the
region. The Philippines, Singapore, Australia, and even Hawaii are now at a
heightened state of alert. The US Navy has ordered ‘round the clock patrols by
the airships USS Oklahoma City and
USS Hilo to monitor for any enemy
activity. Great Britain is planning on sending more thousands of more troops to
Australia. The UK is also planning on sending troops to assist France in its
ongoing conflict with the Japanese in French Indo-China. British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill is quoted to have stated “All the nations of the West must
stand together to fight this terror attempting to place a stranglehold on
islands of Asia.”
-“Japs Take Hong Kong,” Honolulu Star-Bulletin, June 22, 1944.
July 1, 1944- President
Hull today rejected a plan proposed by the Joint Chiefs that would have
transferred over 1/3 of the Atlantic Fleet to the Pacific Fleet, to boost the
Navy’s ability to wage war against the Japanese. I think it foolish, but then
again I think a lot of Hull’s ideas aren’t so great. Like his idea not to use
the USS Eagle anymore. May even have
it scrapped! Now, I of course love airplanes, but I don’t think they are
dignified enough to carry the President of the United States around. Especially
to an Allied War meeting in London. But what do I know; I’m just the Vice
President.
-Personal Diary of President Will Rogers, “Personal
Documents of President Rogers, from the Hull Presidency,” The Will Rogers Presidential
Library, Claremont, OK.
JAPAN BOMB SINGAPORE, DARWIN
PERTH, JULY 27- The Empire of Japan launched simultaneous
bombing raids on Singapore and Darwin today. The Japs were able to inflict a
lot of damage on civilian craft at harbor in Singapore, and severely damaged an
outpost of the Royal Army in the city of Darwin, Australia.
Troops
are continuing to pour into Australia from around the British Empire, in an
attempt to convince the Japanese not to attempt an invasion of the
continent.
-“Japan Bomb Singapore, Darwin,” The Times (London), July 28, 1944.
PRESIDENT TO GO TO LONDON
WASHINGTON, APRIL 28- Tomorrow, President Hull will depart
for London for a conference with British officials on how to coordinate the war
with Japan. Instead of taking the USS Eagle,
Hull has decided to fly on a passenger plane on loan from American Airlines.
The President stated that, “While the airship is an amazing craft, it is also
slow, cumbersome, and inefficient when compared to modern airplanes, and far
cheaper to build and maintain. We are in a war, and we cannot afford to waste
any time.”
President
Hull will be accompanied by his wife and the Secretary of State Harry Truman.
The London Conference will begin on May 2 and will last an entire week.
–“President to Go to London,” The
Washington Post, April 29, 1945.
US PRESIDENT GOES MISSNG
LONDON, MAY 1- U.S. President Cordell Hull was due in at the
Queen Victoria Aerodrome early yesterday evening, but his plane has not yet
landed. The Presidential aircraft, a plane borrowed from American Airlines (the
President deciding to not use the USS Eagle
airship that was used during the Roosevelt administration), was supposed to
make radio contact with the Royal Air force sometime between 1 and 3 yesterday
afternoon, but has yet to do so. The American and British authorities are now
officially launching a search, and fear that the President’s plane may have
gone down in the Atlantic.
-“US President Goes Missing,” The Times (London), May 2, 1945
May 1, 1945- My
God…Hull’s plane went down. I’m trying to be optimistic, but I can’t. The plane
crashed in the middle of the Atlantic…there’s no way he survived. None. Deep
down I know he’s dead. And that makes me…makes me the 34th President
of the United States, during the middle of a war. If only he’d stuck with using
the Zeppelin instead of that blasted plane….
-Personal Diary of President Will Rogers, “Personal
Documents of President Rogers, from the Hull Presidency,” The Will Rogers
Presidential Library, Claremont, OK.
PRESIDENT HULL DEAD
WASHINGTON, May 4- The United State’s Coast Guard today
announced that they had discovered a small amount of wreckage that they
believed belonged to President Hull’s airplane. No bodies were found. With this
discovery, the Coast Guard announced that they believe that the President and
the First Lady, along with the Secretary of State, where dead. After the
announcement, Vice President Will Rogers was sworn in by the Chief Justice on
the floor of the House of Representatives. After this, he gave a short address
to the Congress and the Nation, before calling a meeting of Hull’s Cabinet to
discuss the nation’s future.
-“President Hull Dead,” The
New York Times, May 5, 1945.
“My Fellow Americans,
I come to you today via the radio in the midst of a national
tragedy. As you all know, President Hull’s airplane crashed into the Atlantic
earlier this week, and that there are no survivors.
If ever I had wanted to become president of this great
country of ours, this is not the method I’d have chosen. But we do not always
get the luxury of choosing our course in life. Sometimes it is thrust on us, as
has happened with the loss of President Hull.
I come to you today to assure you that your government will
not falter in this time of tragedy. We will honor the memory of my good friend
by fulfilling his wishes for this country to the best of our ability. We will
fight this war in the Pacific to its end, which if I have anything to do about
it will end in American triumph. We cannot allow this tragedy to derail our
resolve to win, our resolve to improve, our resolve to move forward.
---pause for
applause---
Two days from now we will honor the life of President Hull
at his memorial service here in Washington, but right now we must focus on the
future. We must find a way to truly shift the tide of war in our favor, or
resign ourselves to Japanese control over the Pacific. I, for one, am not ready
to give the Japanese that pleasure!
---pause for
applause---
This war will be one, ladies and gentlemen, and I will do
all that is within my power to bring this war to a close before the 1948
election. We will have peace, and we will restore the balance of power in the
Pacific. To achieve this, I will be ordering a number of our ships within the
Atlantic fleet to be shifted to the Pacific in order to boost our Navy’s
ability to fight the Japanese, along with an increase in the number of Army Air
Corp personnel. We will take the war to the Japanese by the end of 1945!
---pause for
applause---
Ladies and gentlemen of this grand country of ours, I
promise to you today that I will do all that I can to fully serve this nation
and it’s people. May God bless you all, and may He bless the United States of
America!”
---long applause as
President Rogers leaves podium---
-Radio address given by newly sworn in President Will Rogers
following the crash and subsequent death of President Cordell Hull, May 4,
1945; Smithsonian Institute, Washington, D.C.
President
Cordell Hull’s death was a real turning point in the Great Pacific War of the
1940s. On May 30, President Rogers ordered that nearly 2/3 of the Atlantic
Fleet be transferred to the Pacific. The ships set sail on June 12, arriving at
their destinations of California on June 21, and Hawaii on June 30. We now know
that this action prevented several Japanese plans for attacks farther west,
including a canceled bomb run on Pearl Harbor and a planned attack on the
Panama Canal.
With
the bulk of the US Navy now in the Pacific, the combined naval forces of the
United States, the United Kingdom, and France were enough to turn the tide
against the Japanese, ending the stalemate that had occurred after the Japanese
attempted to take Singapore in early 1945 before Hull’s death.
On
January 3, 1946, Japan launched a massive invasion and attack against the
Philippine Islands as an attempt to draw the American’s away from Hawaii.
However, the Japanese were not able to keep the British from assisting, and a
massive number of troops were brought in from Australia. By the end of the
month, Japan had given up on their invasion of the Philippines. And
furthermore, with British troops now mobilized out of Australia, Britain was
able to help France liberate French Indo-China, starting in early March of
1946.
In
May, the Japanese attempted to strike the Americans at the heart with an all
out assault on Pearl Harbor. The USS Hilo
and the USS Oklahoma City spotted
the strike force, complete with the so-called “Kamikaze Zeps”, before they were
within range of the Hawaiian Islands. They radioed a warning to the fleet,
which immediately weighed anchor and sailed out to meet the enemy. The two
airships attempted to sail back to the safety of Oahu, but only the Oklahoma City made it. The Japanese
intercepted both ships and were able to down the Hilo.
The
strike force, formidable as it was, could not match what amounted to almost the
full strength of the entire US Navy. Over half of the Japanese force ended up
at the bottom of the pacific. The most terrifying weapon the used against the
Americans were their Zeppelins, which they used to attack the aircraft
carriers, ramming their airships full of explosives into the American craft.
There were 7 of this ships, and 4 of them were deployed as planned, the other
three being shot down by the Americans. Those 4 ships were able to sink 1
carrier and severely damage another, along with sinking one of the battleships,
the USS Arizona.
After
the failures of Hawaii and the Philippines, many in Japan were fed up with the
way the government was handling the war. On September 21, 1946, a coup
overthrew the ultranationalist government in Japan. On October 1st,
with power consolidated and with the blessing of the Emperor, they called for a
cease-fire with the Triple Alliance. Treaty negotiations were held in Honolulu
between October 27 and November 12, 1946, resulting in the Treaty of Hawaii,
which formally ended the Great Pacific War.
The
Treaty of Hawaii forced Japan to give up all territory taken from Great Britain
and France, and to pull all forces out of China and Manchuria (which was to be
given back to China). Korea and Formosa, however, remained under Japanese
control. Japan was forced to reduce its armed forces to about ¼ of its size
when the war started in 1944, including the disbandment of its airship program.
All existing airships were turned over to the members of the Triple Alliance.
By
1947, US and British troops had moved in to China to oversee the Japanese
withdrawal, along with troops in Japan itself to oversee the disarmament. This
would set the stage for America and Britain’s minor conflict of the 1950s while
attempting to bring order to China.
- Springer, Dr. Joseph. I
Never Met a Man I didn’t Like: The Will Rogers Presidency."Chapter 2:
The Great Pacific War.” Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006
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