Hurly-Burly Thoroughfare

New tricks and new weapons intensified the air assault on Japan.

P: Tiny, hard-won Iwo, for weeks a haven for B-29s in trouble on their way home, was now being used as a filling station on the way north from the Marianas to Japan. Result: B-29s stopping at Iwo to take on fuel stepped up their explosives load to a maximum of ten tons.

P: Land-based Army & Navy planes made their first coordinated attack with the flyers of Admiral William Halsey's Third Fleet, capping a week of unprecedented assault on the remnant of what was once the Imperial Japanese Navy. Among the Japanese casualties: the battleships Haruna (and no mistake, this time), Hyuga, Na gato, Ise.

P: Photographs passed by Navy censors disclosed an important feature of U.S. carrier practice: the use of catapults, flush with the flight decks, for carrier-plane takeoffs. Benefits: fewer losses in takeoffs, more planes (and more striking power) per carrier.

P: The B-29s had a new rival. Revealed in action (in the Philippines) for the first time was the four-engined B32, Consolidated Vultee's bid for V.L.R. (Very Long Range) recognition. Under wraps in the Pacific since May, the B-32 is a little smaller than the Superfortress but is a competitor in speed, range and bomb load. The new bomber is also simpler: on the off-chance that the B-29's pressurized cabin and elaborate fire-control system might not work, the Air Forces deliberately instructed the B-32 designers to omit extras, come up with a bomber stripped to absolute essentials. The B-32s in action last week were part of General MacArthur's air forces which made their third attack in seven days on Shanghai, ranged from Japan and Korea to the Gulf of Siam.

One Way Street. Reported New York Timesman William H. Lawrence, writing his story in a B-29 over Japan:

"Japanese resistance is so meager as to be almost unbelievable. There is little antiaircraft fire in the target area and if any enemy night fighters are in the air, none has made aggressive sweeps toward our aircraft. In the time we have been near the target we have seen only a few phosphorus shells from land-based flak batteries and a few tracers from small warships in the harbor but none came close. . . . They could not save this northern Honshu shipping center [Aomori] even though they knew 24 hours in advance [see above] that we were going to burn it to the ground."

Already the Tokyo radio was complaining that the sky over Japan had become a "hurlyburly thoroughfare."

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