Flyboys : A True Story of Courage

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Summary: Shades of Gray Pervade View of WWII's Pacific Theater
Review: As a history lesson on the American wartime mindset during World War II, this is an intriguing book that may ultimately make you feel conflicted. The story ostensibly focuses on nine American pilots shot down over the remote island of Chichi Jima. One pilot was George H. W. Bush, the future 41st President of the United States, who was rescued by a submarine. The other eight were captured by the Japanese, and disappeared. A military inquiry after the war was labeled top secret and sealed the story of the fate of these men from even their families. With painstaking research, author James Bradley has uncovered the truth behind what happened to these men. Even Bush didn't know the details of the fates of his fellow fliers, and post-war politics prevented the revelations presented here of wartime atrocities that befell the eight men on Chichi Jima.

Bradley uses this story to paint a broader canvas of how the Americans and Japanese viewed war very differently. The key difference was that Americans had a will to live and that the Japanese, true kamikazes in their souls, had a will to die. Their "spirit warrior" leaders bent their soldiers to their monomaniacal will and sent them off on a course that would ensure its fulfillment. These disclosures are vital to share now, but just as compelling is how the author presents the historic hypocrisy on the U.S. side, specifically how subjugating other peoples was ingrained in the American psyche and how imperialism was felt justified only for the U.S. While the Japanese occupation of Manchuria reflected horrendously barbaric acts, no less destructive was the air power demonstrated by the Americans. In one March 1945 firebomb attack on Tokyo alone, nearly 100,000 Japanese died, surpassing the death toll from the nuclear-bomb attack on Nagasaki. If anything, Bradley makes the reader understand how gray things truly were and why events happened the way they did between the United States and Japan. It is this thoughtful, fearless examination of the gray zone that makes this essential reading on a defining passage in our history.

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Summary: I Could Not Put It Down...I Will Not Be The Same
Review: I Can now hold James Bradley personally responsible for many early mornings and late nights for writing, first, "Flags of Our Fathers" and now "Flyboys"...Despite the need to study for final exams and despite having a ton of work to do, I found myself reading Flyboys every chance I got, finishing the 336 pages of text in about a week.

Bradley tells the story of American pilots who get shot down over the Japanese Island of Chichi Jima, and least that's the cover story of the book. But in actuality, the book is much more than a narrow-viewed focus on the lives and fates of a few among millions dead in the fierce Pacific battles of WWII. Instead, it is the story of war, the story of the rise and fall of two empires: America and Japan. Each saw in the other nothing but soul-less devils, holding the world to hypocritical, self-serving standards. The result allowed Americans to kill millions of combatants and noncombatants alike in the fire bombing of Japanese citizens. The Japanese would rape, murder, and even eat (yes, eat) millions of Americans, Chinese, and Russians. However, despite such savagery from both sides, Bradley does an excellent job of portraying the big picture that could allow such things to happen The individual perpetrators of the crimes are not exonerated, but I often found myself thinking that I would have done the same if I was in the same situation. Would I have incinerated infants with napalm? Would I have speared or decapitated other human beings? I would recommend this thought provoking book, tracing the paths of some American flyboys on their road from childhood in the Homeland to their cruel demise in the Land of the Rising Sun. Mr. Bradley obviously poured his heart into the writing of this book, just as he did his first, and his extensive research and heart-searching shows.

If you know much or nothing of the war in the Pacific, this book will still have much to teach you. You will not walk away from a single chapter untouched. I certainly was not able to: Highly Recommmended.
-Jacob Hantla

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Summary: A frightening story of babarity and courage
Review: It is often the mark of a truly outstanding work of historical writing that while much of the subject matter is painful to read the story is nonetheless difficult to put down. Such is the case with James Bradley's second successful World War II book, "Flyboys" a look at the fate of the American flyers shot down over the Pacific island of Ichi Jima late in World War II.
As with "Flag of our Fathers" Bradley's greatest feat is to make the reader feel completely familiar with characters from over a half century ago, many long dead. This knack is undoubtedly a testament to his abilities as an interviewer of the survivors and his researching skills.
The author also possesses a requisite that many historians lack -- even handedness. Bradley does not seek to merely portray one dimensional heroes and villains. While his look at Japanese atrocities is unflinching, he does not spare the United States. Indeed, early in the book he details the manner of 19th century US expansion into the Pacific and its ultimate role in creating the monster that Japan was. Bradley's harsh assessment of Emperor Hirohito and Japanese military leaders, is always butressed by the facts and never comes off as shrill.
While "Flyboys" focuses on the fate of six U.S. flyers shot down over Ichi Jima and their captors, all is presented within the context of the war. Though at times the reader may start to feel that Bradley has launched into a digression it soon becomes evident that he is placing events within the bigger picture.
"Flyboys" is a heat-breaking, infuriating story that, as well as any recent book, exposes the horror of war and how quickly civilization dissipates in its wake as men answer to the beast within.
This is also a story of remarkable courage and how sometimes justice is done.
Parts of the book are particularly gruesome, but as this is a story of war the barbarity never feels gratuitous.
"Flyboys" succeeds as truly good history does, by putting relatively small stories into context and showing how people responded to traumatic circumstances.



Rating:
Summary: Thought Provoking
Review: One of the most thought provoking books I've read in years. The poor reviews come from people who want to kill the messenger, i.e. Bradley.

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Summary: Excellent, remarkably balanced intent
Review: Read this book over a week, and found it remarkable. It was well paced, and the writing did not call attention to itself. He made effort to explain the human conditions on both side of the war, and the unfairness inherent in many human events - particularly war. Left the book understanding the war and humans a little better.



Rating:
Summary: History That Needs Telling
Review: The Japanese have NEVER acknowledged their war atrocities. Their textbooks and museums hide their horrible behavior during WWII; the average Japanese knows little if anything about the Rape of Nanking, or the slaughter of millions in Manchuria and Korea, or the vicious treatment of POW's by their troops.

Even in the U.S. we've hidden, and continue to hide, the horrors committed by the Japanese against our POW's. "Flyboys" details the sickening treatment by the Japanese of a small group of American Naval Aviators shot down during attacks on the tiny island of Chichi Jima.

After the war, the courts-martial of the Japanese involved in this affair were sealed and classified Top Secret - because of fear of retribution against Japan by a horrified America. The cover-up lasted until Bradley, who wrote Flags of Our Fathers (about Iwo Jima) heard from a reader who told him the story of Chichi Jima. Bradley, then uncovered the full story via the Freedom of Infomation act and wrote this very powerful book.

It's a horrible story; one that should not be hidden, but instead should be told and retold.

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Summary: Japanese Swords killed More people than Atom Bombs in WW2!
Review: Truth is the first casualty of war and many other situations, in this book Mr Bradley seeks to reveal several truths of WW2. The first is to discover the covered up truth of the deaths of a few American flyers against the Japanese held island of Chichi Jima. This he does with intense research. The greater part of the book, however, is a descroption of the events and attidues taht led up to that war, and information that many people has overlooked concerning the horrors of that warfare.
Bradley makes the claim from the outset that the belief system of America was Christian, and therefore caused a blatant killing of Japanese civilians because there was always forgiveness from God. This is quite an assumption in many ways, and he uses the term "Christian" without qualifying it. For me, though, he is not talking about true followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, merely those of a vaguely Christian tradition, but for whom it makes no impact on their lives. Conversely, the Japanese are described as believing that they are gods, and therefore all other nations are to be ruled by them, with the Emperor as the chief god over them all. The militarism of Japan in the early 20th Century is well laid out, and the reasons that the whole nation blindly followed orders from their irrisponsible government because the had been conditioned to believe it was the Emperor commanding them.
Teh details of the Japanes actions in WW2 make gruesome reading, with stark facts revealed such as the manufacture and use of biological weapons (incubated through living Chinese people, and stored in their blood, very last drop squeezed out whilst still alive), in revenge for Doolittles raid on Tokyo. Shocking but true was the killing of chinese like they were animals, mostly through beheading with swords. The opposition of Japanese verses American weaponry is astounding, that Samurai swords killed more people that atom bombs in WW2 makes the whole disarmament movement a farce! Surely the problem lies in our moral basis, not the technology we develop. The startegy to incinerate Japans cities is discussed, proving that between a rock and a hard place there were not any other viable possibilities to finish the war in Americas favor.
The Navy Flyboys have a hero amongst them, George Bush sr. He is described as the "most accomplished man alive" (for the reader to decide that!) and he travels to Chichi Jima as part of writing the book, and to remember where he was shot down and rescued by a US sub. How the world would be different if that event hadn't occured! Others shot down were interned by the Japanese until executed by men obeying orders from drunken senior ranking officers as if it was the Emperor giving the order. The later war crimes trials are also discussed, and the cover up that American politians made to actually play down Japanese atrocities. The fact that many Japanese committed acts of cannibalism during tthe war, often in China, but here eating the livers of American Navy pilots. Such atrocities had no classification for the war crimes trials, being so repulsive it didn't fearture in the accusers catagories of crime. The euthemism "failure to give a decent burial" was used to classify cannibalism in the trials. All startling information that deserves rememberance in the light of present day conflicts.
I would like to say too that this book balances the actual events with what could have been for America. The fact that the bombing of Japan, including, but not because of the 2 atom bombs, caused the Japanese government to do a brave thing that no other Japanese laeders had ever done; surrender. What if they hadn't? the question is answered briefly witha description of the likely US forces and the plan to invade the islands of Japan.
The storm that caused the greatest storm damage ver in the history of the US Navy came in October 1945, and destroyed most of the ships in a harbor that would have seen the build up of an invasion fleet against Japan. Bradley terms this happening as a "Divine wind" from which the kamikazes took their name, as if his beliefs lie with the Japanes "spirit warriors" that he makes so much of throughout the book. A better term for "spirit warrior" for me would have been "demon".