THE — DOOLITTLE RAID

On 18 April 1942, American bombers under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Jimmy Doolittle took off from the USS Hornet. Their target: Tokyo. Their mission: Avenge Pearl Harbor

- MICHAEL E HASKEW

The Doolittle Raid was an audacious bombing attack against Tokyo on 18 April 1942, as American carrier-based aircraft struck the Japanese capital city. The raid was conducted by 16 North American B-25 Mitchell medium bombers of the US Army Air Forces (USAAF), flying from the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Hornet. This audacious mission was conceived, planned and executed within five months of the 7 December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. The bombing of US military installations had plunged the previously neutral nation into World War II.

The Doolittle Raid was undertaken in response to the string of Japanese victories during the early months of World War II in the Pacific. Following Pearl Harbor, the Japanese had seized Wake Island, Guam and the Dutch East Indies. Japanese forces were surging across the Philippines and advancing on all fronts. The Doolittle Raid, though risky, was intended to bolster American morale and to strike a surprising blow against the Japanese, who considered their island nation unassailable by enemy forces.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt expressed his personal interest in bombing Japan early in the Pacific War; however, the distance involved in crossing the expanse of the Pacific Ocean and the risk to precious US military assets made the prospects for such an attack seem remote. Nevertheless, Captain Francis S Low, commander-in-chief of the US Navy, proposed that USAAF bombers, which possessed greater range than naval aircraft, might be launched from the deck of an American aircraft carrier sailing within striking distance of the Japanese home islands.

Planning the raid