Picture of the day

In the early 1980s I remember the USAF personnel coming to the North Marg at Lahr and practicing with this system, calling in the recovery aircraft and winching a weighted dummy up, up and away. I recall they showed this system in the movie the Green Berets.

Also a James Bond movie
 
There's been some commentary that B-29 raids using incendiary bombs caused greater devastation to the Japanese than did HE bombs and even the 2 nuclear strikes.

There's no doubt about that. 32x 500 lb M64 high explosive bombs is nothing to scoff at, but 40x 500 lb M69 incendiary clusters, well, that was just nasty.

Tokyo_1945-3-10-1.jpg


Tokyo after the massive Operation Meetinghouse firebombing attack on the night of March 9–10, 1945, the single most destructive raid in military aviation history.
 
There's no doubt about that. 32x 500 lb M64 high explosive bombs is nothing to scoff at, but 40x 500 lb M69 incendiary clusters, well, that was just nasty.

Tokyo_1945-3-10-1.jpg
One night we departed Tokyo’s Narita airport with a climbing turn over Tokyo bay and the very large city looked lovely all lit up. My buddy in the left seat said , wow doesn’t that look nice...... I said, yep, and too bad this wasn’t the spring of 45 and this wasn’t a B-29. He got a little chuckle out of that as we were just given 3 months notice and the only severance was, “sayonara”.
 
I'm always a bit amazed to watch a Japanese movie from the 1960s and see what those people were able to build with 20 years and almost unlimited American dollars. Remarkable.

Napier said this about that:

quote-the-best-way-to-quiet-a-country-is-a-good-thrashing-followed-by-great-kindness-afterwards-even-charles-james-napier-255371.jpg


The yanks did exactly that, and aside from brother Bush1 getting screwed on his gig, I reckon it generally worked. :)

Anyhow, pics:

japans-cute-offensive-1428695233.jpg


They're a strange and wonderful people, our Japanese friends... Here's an actual recruitment poster:

moe1.jpg
 
Speaking of the AH-1 Cobra helicopter (that's a Fuji built AH-1S above), the USMC is divesting itself of its remaining AH-1W SuperCobras. Get yours early!

il_fullxfull.234696585.jpg
 
I'm always a bit amazed to watch a Japanese movie from the 1960s and see what those people were able to build with 20 years and almost unlimited American dollars. Remarkable.

Napier said this about that:

quote-the-best-way-to-quiet-a-country-is-a-good-thrashing-followed-by-great-kindness-afterwards-even-charles-james-napier-255371.jpg


The yanks did exactly that, and aside from brother Bush1 getting screwed on his gig, I reckon it generally worked. :)

Anyhow, pics:

japans-cute-offensive-1428695233.jpg


They're a strange and wonderful people, our Japanese friends... Here's an actual recruitment poster:

moe1.jpg

Great selection of uniforms when they sign on.;) They must be bumping up female recruiting to compensate for the large number of "Hikikomori", the name give to large numbers of young males who opt out of society, live in their parents basements sleeping and eating and spend their time living virtual lives on the computer.:eek:
 
Great selection of uniforms when they sign on.;) They must be bumping up female recruiting to compensate for the large number of "Hikikomori", the name give to large numbers of young males who opt out of society, live in their parents basements sleeping and eating and spend their time living virtual lives on the computer.:eek:

Reckon those Navy-issue stayups are a very good thing indeed. The lil' gold stripes are a nice touch. :)

Anyhoo, more Japanese Cobra gunship weirdness/goodness:

pslg1nifhhcqorymhcgn.jpg


Camo rating zero. But so very kawaii! :)
 
21 January 1968, B-52G Stratofortress 'Hobo 28', with four Mark 28 thermonuclear bombs aboard, crashes in Greenland.

Sparking a clean-up operation codenamed 'Crested Ice'.

 
I think that silver tube above him is the tube connecting the front and rear section of the plane. The airplane was pressurised, and that tube was a way to navigate from one end to the other and stay under pressure.

But when the HE bombing raids were not being effective, and when the stocks of incendiaries was sufficient, LeMay changed tactics to low level raids, negating the need for pressurization.

"To maximize the effectiveness of the firebombing attacks, LeMay ordered the B-29s to fly at the low altitude of 5,000 feet (1,500 m) and bomb by night; this represented a significant change from the Command's standard tactics, which focused on high-altitude daylight bombing. As Japan's night fighter force was weak and the anti-aircraft batteries were less effective at night, LeMay also had most of the B-29s' defensive guns removed; by reducing the weight of the aircraft in this way they were able to carry more bombs.[83] These changes were not popular with XXI Bomber Command's aircrew, as they believed that it was safer to fly heavily armed aircraft at high altitude."


I'd say the tactics worked.

800px-Areas_of_principal_Japanese_cities_destoyed_by_US_bombing.jpg
 

Yes it really is a sad story. I've flown over it a few times years ago when I was on Hercs going to Alert from Thule. One day we had some extra fuel and did a low pass. Some of our heli guys actually landed beside it and took some pics but that was before these guys destroyed it for good. Their intentions were definately good but the corners that were cut trying to make a deadline proved costly. Damn shame.....
 
In the early 1980s I remember the USAF personnel coming to the North Marg at Lahr and practicing with this system, calling in the recovery aircraft and winching a weighted dummy up, up and away. I recall they showed this system in the movie the Green Berets.

Folks it was in use in the 60s

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_COLDFEET

And cfs alert was a staging point
 
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