The Bomber Mafia Intro PDF

# The Bomber Mafia ## Introduction - The largest airport in the world was located in the Western Pacific, around 1,500 miles from the coast of Japan, on one of a cluster of small tropical islands known as the Marianas. The Marianas are the southern end of a largely submerged mountain range - the ti...

# The Bomber Mafia ## Introduction - The largest airport in the world was located in the Western Pacific, around 1,500 miles from the coast of Japan, on one of a cluster of small tropical islands known as the Marianas. The Marianas are the southern end of a largely submerged mountain range - the tips of volcanoes poking up through the deep ocean waters. For most of their history, the Marianas were too small to be of much interest or use to anyone in the wider world. Until the age of airpower, when all of a sudden they took on enormous importance. ## The Bomber Mafia - The Marianas where in Japanese hands for most of the Second World War. But after a brutal campaign, they fell to the US Military in the summer of 1944. Saipan was first, then Tinian and Guam. In just three months, an entire air base was fully operational on Saipan. Then, on the island of Tinian, the largest airport in the world was built with 8,500-foot runways, four of them. Following that, on Guam, what is now Andersen Air Force Base, the US Air Force's gateway to the Far East. Then came the planes. - The B-29 could fly faster and higher than any other bomber in the world and, more crucially, farther than any other bomber. And that extended range-combined with the capture of the Marianas-meant that for the first time since the war in the Pacific began, US Army Air Forces were within striking distance of Japan. A special unit was created to handle the fleet of bombers now parked in the Marianas: the Twenty-First Bomber Command, under the leadership of a brilliant young general named Haywood Hansell. ## The Fall of Haywood Hansell and the Rise of Curtis LeMay - Throughout the fall and winter of 1944, Hansell launched attack after attack. Hundreds of B-29s skimmed over the Pacific waters, dropped their payloads on Japan, then turned back for the Marianas. As Hansell's airmen prepared to launch themselves at Tokyo, reporters and camera crews flew in from the mainland, recording the excitement for the folks back home. ## Curtis LeMay Arrives - When Curtis LeMay arrived for the changeover, he flew himself to the island in a B-29 bomber. "The Star Spangled Banner" was played. The airmen of the Twenty-First Bomber Command marched by for review. A public relations officer proposed a picture of the two of them to mark the moment. LeMay had a pipe in his mouth-he always had a pipe in his mouth-and didn't know what to do with it. He kept trying to put it in his pocket. “General,” the aide said, “please let me hold your pipe while the picture is taken.” LeMay said, in a quiet voice, "Where do you want me to stand?" The cameras clicked and captured Hansell squinting off into the distance, LeMay looking down at the ground. Two men, anxious to be anywhere but in each other's company. And with that, it was over. The Bomber Mafia is the story of that moment. What led up to it and what happened next-because that change of command reverberates to this day. ## How Dreams Go Awry - There is something that has always puzzled me about technological revolutions. Some new idea of innovation comes along, and it is obvious to all that it will upend our world. The internet. Social media. In previous generations, it was the telephone and the automobile. There's an expectation that because of this new invention, things will get better, more efficient, safer, richer, faster. Which they do, in some respects. But then things also, invariably, go sideways. At one moment, social media is being hailed as something that will allow ordinary citizens to upend tyranny. And then in the next moment, social media is feared as the platform that will allow citizens to tyrannize one another. The automobile was supposed to bring freedom and mobility, which it did for a while. But then millions of people found themselves living miles from their workplaces, trapped in endless traffic jams on epic commutes. How is it that, sometimes, for any number of unexpected and random reasons, technology slips away from its intended path? - The Bomber Mafia is a case study in how dreams go awry. And how, when some new, shiny idea drops down from the heavens, it does not land, softly, in our laps. It lands hard, on the ground, and shatters. The story I’m about to tell is not really a war story. Although it mostly takes place in wartime. It is the story of a Dutch genius and his homemade computer. A band of brothers in central Alabama. A British psychopath. Pyromaniacal chemists in a basement labs at Harvard. It’s a story about the messiness of our intentions, because we always forget the mess when we look back. - And at the heart of it all are Haywood Hansell and Curtis LeMay, who squared off in the jungles of Guam. ## Part One: The Dream - "THIS ISN'T WORKING. YOU'RE OUT." One was sent home. One stayed on, with a result that would lead to the darkest night of the Second World War. Consider their story and ask yourself- What would I have done? Which side would I have been on?