A well-done documentary, detailing the design and deployment of the largest strategic bomber of World War II, Boeing's B-29.
It's difficult to grasp the size of the bloody thing when you see it, as we almost always do, in long shot, taking off, landing, or in the air. This episode includes a few minutes of film from one of Boeing's plants and show the airplane being assembled, some of the footage shot from below as cranes move massive wings and body parts across the factory floor. It's only then, when the camera looks up at a huge tunnel of aluminum being made from sections that we can get an idea of the gigantism involved.
Of course, the B-29 was a famous bomber, if only because it dropped two atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. But it would be well known even if those horrible attacks had never taken place. Some of the firestorms created by B-29s in earlier raids killed even more citizens than the two famous nuclear weapons.
This is evidently a British production or at least the narrator, John Honey, is English. And as is often the case, when the Brits show Americans doing something of interest, the sound track jumps with the music of some sort of big-band boogie woogie. I love it.
I suspect that many of those who watch this documentary already have at least a general idea of its use during World War II. But this episode is surprisingly comprehensive in its coverage. Most descriptions stop with the delivery of the atomic bombs but this one goes on to describe its value as a drone, as a testing platform for mid-air refueling, and as a weapon against the army of North Korea.
And the detail is sometimes surprising. During the war, the first B-29 raids against Japan were launched from bases in China. They're usually dismissed as inadequate without much reason being given. Here, we learn that the runways were build by hand -- I mean, by HAND. Hundreds of Chinese sitting around with hammers and making little rocks out of big ones, then hauling a two-ton iron cylinder over the field to flatten it. Chiang Kai Sheck, who was on our side during the war, charged the US millions of dollars for the construction and use of the airfields, which turned into muck during the rainy season. Fuel had to be hauled by C-47s over the Himalayan Mountains from India, using up three gallons of fuel for every gallon delivered. And from these bases, only the southernmost islands of Japan could be reached. That's what "inadequate" means in this context.
Curtis LeMay is the hero of the piece for good reason, but his grasp may have been excessive. General Frank Merrill of "Merrill's Marauders" told his daughter that LeMay was hurrying to get the atomic bombs dropped before Japan could surrender.
Well, at any rate, you'll find this documentary somewhat different from the usual encomium.