Existing comment:
Boeing B-29 Superfortress: Bockscar:
The B-29 on display, Bockscar, dropped the Fat Man atomic bomb on Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945, three days after the atomic attack against Hiroshima. Bockscar was one of 15 specially modified "Silverplate" B-29s assigned to the 509th Composite Group. Most B-29s carried eight .50-cal. machine guns in remote controlled turrets, two .50-cal. machine guns and one 20mm cannon in a tail turret, and up to 20,000 pounds of bombs. Silverplate B-29s, however, retained only the tail turret and had their armor removed to save weight so that the heavy atomic bombs of the time could be carried over a longer distance.
Designed in 1940 as an eventual replacement for the B-17 and B-24, the first B-29 made its maiden flight on Sept. 21, 1942. In December 1943 U.S. Army Air Forces leadership committed the Superfortress to Asia, where its great range made it particularly suited for the long over-water flights against the Japanese homeland from bases in China. During the last two months of 1944, B-29s began operating against Japan from the islands of Saipan, Guam and Tinian. With the advent of the conflict in Korea in June 1950, the B-29 returned to combat. Although vulnerable to MiG-15 jet fighter attacks, the Superfortress remained effective against several types of targets throughout the Korean War.
Bockscar was flown to the museum on Sept. 26, 1961.
Bockscar: Prologue to the Mission:
By August 1945, U.S. Navy submarines and aerial mining by the Army Air Forces (AAF) severely restricted Japanese shipping. The AAF controlled the skies over Japan and the AAF's B-29 bombing attacks crippled its war industry. A plan for the invasion of Japan had been drawn up; Operation Olympic was scheduled for November 1945. Estimates of Allied casualties ranged from 250,000 to a million with much greater losses to the Japanese. To repel invaders, Japan had a veteran army of some two million ready, an army that had already shown its ferocity and fanaticism in combat. Some 8,000 military aircraft were available that could be used for devastating Kamikaze (suicide) attacks on U.S. ships. The draft had been extended to include men from age 15 to 60 and women from 17 to 45, adding millions of civilians ready to defend their homeland to the death, with sharpened sticks if necessary.
Experience throughout the Pacific war had shown that Japanese combat casualties had run five to 20 times those suffered by the Allies, particularly in the battles of the Philippines and Okinawa. Whatever the predicted Allied losses, the potential Japanese military and civilian casualties would have been staggering. Whether Japan would have surrendered prior to the invasion without the use of the atomic bombs is a question that can never be answered. Using the history and projections available to him, President Truman made the decision to use the atomic bomb in an effort to end the war quickly, thus avoiding a costly invasion.
Bockscar: The Aircraft:
The Boeing-designed B-29 #44-27287 was built by the Glenn L. Martin Co. at Omaha, Nebraska ,at a cost of about $639,000. It was accepted by the USAAF on April 19, 1945 and was delivered to the 393rd Bomb Squadron at Wendover Field in the Utah salt flats. There aircrews of the 509th Composite Group were engaged in intensive training under a cloak of secrecy. In June, aircraft and crew flew to Tinian Island in the Marianas. From there, Bockscar, named for its pilot Frederick C. Bock, flew five bombing missions. On four of these, a 10,000 pound bomb loaded with high explosives was dropped. Nicknamed "pumpkin" bombs because of their shape and color, these were of the same size and shape as the actual "fat man" atomic bomb dropped at Nagasaki.
After Japan surrendered, Bockscar and the 393rd Bomb Squadron was reassigned to Roswell Field, New Mexico. in error, The Great Artiste was named in some official reports as the Superfortress that dropped the atomic bomb at Nagasaki. This mistake was discovered when preparations were being made to preserve the aircraft for later museum display. When the discrepancy was found, it was Bockscar that was retired in September 1946 to the desert storage facility at Davis-Monthan field near Tucson, Arizona. There it remained until September 1961 when it made one more flight, to Wright-Patterson AFB to become part of the growing collection of display aircraft at the U.S. Air Force Museum. Today about a million visitors each year view Bockscar, the aircraft that ended the world's most costly war.
Bockscar: The Aftermath of the Mission:
Even after the second atomic bomb attack, disagreement raged within the Japanese government between the peace advocates and those who urged continued resistance. An attempted coup by militant extremists failed and on August 14 Japan surrendered unconditionally. In a break with tradition, Emperor Hirohito announced the surrender in a recorded radio message. Japan accepted the terms of the July 26th Potsdam Declaration calling for an unconditional surrender, terms which the Japanese had rejected previously. This was the first time the Japanese people had ever heard their emperor's voice, and some Japanese officers committed suicide upon hearing his decision. On August 28th, U.S. aircraft began landing the first occupation forces at Tokyo. B-29s now were flying relief missions, dropping food, medicine, and other supplies to U.S. and Allied prisoners at some 150 Japanese prisoner of war (POW) camps.
Americans generally felt no moral dilemma over the dropping of the atomic bombs. The surrender ended more than a decade of Japanese aggression in Asia and the Pacific. After three and one-half years of brutal warfare following Pearl Harbor, Americans anxiously awaited the homecoming of our surviving service personnel and a return to peacetime normalcy. To an American POW working in a coal mine near Nagasaki when the atomic bomb detonated, the bomb meant survival. He weighed only 98 pounds after 40 months of captivity. |