Combat Air Patrol: June 1944 Saipan

What's going on here? USS Manila Bay, a US Navy escort carrier with a deck load of US Army P-47 fighter planes, attacked by Japanese aircraft east of Saipan on June 23, 1944. The story gets better. Here is what the Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships says:

"On 7 May 1944 MANILA BAY sailed for overhaul at Pearl Harbor, where she arrived 18 May. After loading 37 Army P-47 fighters, MANILA BAY sailed 5 June for the Marianas. Steaming via Eniwetok, she reached the eastern approaches to Saipan 19 June. During the next four days she remained east of the embattled island as ships and planes of the Fast Carrier Task Force repulsed the Japanese Fleet in the Battle of the Philippine Sea, and inflicted staggering losses on the enemy, thus crippling the Imperial Japanes Navy's air strength permanently. On 23 June, MANILA BAY came under enemy air attack during refueling operations east of Saipan. Two fighter-bombers attacked her from dead ahead, dropping four bombs which exploded wide to port. Intense antiaircraft fire suppressed further attacks, and as a precautionary and rather unusual move which Admiral Spruance later characterized as "commendable initiative," MANILA BAY launched four of the Army P-47s she was ferrying to fly protective CAP until radar screens were clear of contacts. The Army fighters then flew to Saipan, their intended destination. She launched the remaining planes the next day and returned to Eniwetok, arriving 27 June. After embarking 207 wounded troops, MANILA BAY departed 1 July, touched Pearl Harbor the 8th, and reached San Diego 16 July 1944."

Seventy Years Ago: USS Houston (CL-81) In The Marianas

When last we checked on USS Houston, she was on her way with two other cruisers of her cruiser division, two battleships and seven destroyers enroute to Majuro Atoll. Since that time, the ship has been busy.

On 31 May she joined Vice Admiral Marc Mitscher's Fast Carrier Task Force to take part in the invasion of the Mariana and Palau Islands. Departing on 5 June 1944, Houston screened carrier strike units which pounded the Mariana Islands on 12–13 June and the Bonin Islands on 15–16 June.
While Admiral Richmond K. Turner's amphibious forces landed on Saipan on 15 June, the Japanese prepared to close that island for a "decisive" naval battle. The fleets approached each other on June 19 and engaged in the largest aircraft carrier battle of the war. Four large air raids attacked the American fleet, but the US fighters, with some help from anti-aircraft fire from Houston and the other screening warships, destroyed the attacking Japanese formations.

Mitscher's ships and aircraft were mostly new, the aircraft were improved, and the  pilots and crews well-trained. Mitscher had at his command 7 fleet carriers, 8 light fleet carriers, 7 battleships, 8 heavy cruisers, 13 light cruisers, 58 destroyers, 28 submarines and 956 carrier aircraft. Against this attack force, Japan dispatched 5 fleet carriers, 4 light carriers, 5 battleships, 13 heavy cruisers, 6 light cruisers, 27 destroyers, 24 submarines, 6 oilers, ~450 carrier aircraft and ~300 land-based aircraft.

The outcome: Japan lost 3 fleet carriers sunk, 2 oilers sunk, 550–645 aircraft destroyed and 6 other ships damaged. Americans called the battle "The Great Marianas Turkey Shoot", because so many Japanese aircraft were destroyed with only small American losses.  Japan's naval air power never recovered from the battle. The invasion was secured, though Japanese defenders continued to put up a strong defense.

This was  Houston's initiation into combat.

Town of Oriental Budget Coming Fiscal Year

Tomorrow evening, June 18 at 7:00 pm, the Town holds a public hearing on the budget for the coming fiscal year. Citizens who are interested in the budget should attend the hearing. They should also read the Town Manager's budget report, to which Town Dock has posted a link here.

Diane Miller's budget report is a well-written, clear explanation of the budget process and considerations. Even if you don't attend the hearing, by all means read the report. You will be rewarded by the effort.

I, for one, am pleased with our new manager. She is addressing issues that the Town Board has wrestled with for at least seven years. I am pleased at the progress she and her predecessors have made in that time.

Cox v. Oriental: Nothing New

For those following my case against the Town of Oriental, there was nothing heard today from the Court of Appeals. Next reporting date: July 1.

Seventy Years Ago:Ernie Pyle at Normandy

Ernie Pyle, the GI\s favorite war correspondent, walked upon the beach at Normandy. The incredible scene he described has never been adequately captured in the movies. Just imagine the German prisoners on the bluff overlooking the sea and contemplating their nation's doom.

Here is Pyle's account. :http://journalism.indiana.edu/resources/erniepyle/wartime-columns/the-horrible-waste-of-war/
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Native Americans In 2014

Here is a link to a commercial that aired during last night's NBA final: http://deadspin.com/heres-the-anti-redskins-commercial-that-will-run-during-1588597037?utm_campaign=socialflow_deadspin_facebook&utm_source=deadspin_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

Take the time to watch it.

Collectivists In The Pacific And The English Channel: June 6, 1944

The crew of USS Houston, lying at anchor at Majuro Atoll as they prepared for the next big operation against Japan, probably never thought of themselves as "collectivists" but they were. No single person aboard that ship could perform every function, operate every system, foresee every contingency, or know what to do in every situation. Not even the Captain.

The ship was due to get underway the next morning - June 6th, 1944. After all the practice at war, they would finally see the real thing.

What, pray tell, is "collectivism?" One definition: Collectivism is any philosophic, political, religious, economic, or social outlook that emphasizes the interdependence of every human. No society could exemplify the interdependence of every human more than a complex World War II warship.

The Koch brothers decry "collectivism." Those sailors celebrated it. There was no higher status than "shipmate." What none could accomplish alone, all could do together.

Half a world away, soldiers, sailors, aviators, parachutists, fighter pilots, bomber crews, transport pilots, coxswains of landing craft and combat-equipped troops were already on their way to objectives on the beaches of Normandy and inland.

None thought of themselves as heroes, because they knew the outcome did not depend on any individual effort.

The undertaking was heroic, but it was the heroism of the collective effort.

This is the worst time for the generals. Their job was to prepare, to plan, to calculate, to foresee every contingency. But now there was nothing they could change.

The game was afoot.

Memorial Day Rant By Senator Burr

Memorial Day weekend seems like a strange time for a US Senator to lash out at Veteran's organizations. Senator Richard Burr of North Carolina did just that: http://www.burr.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressOffice.PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=aa65233d-d544-d911-5730-974ef9952220.

Even more interesting, the Veteran's organizations lashed back: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/27/us/veterans-groups-lash-out-at-republican-senator.html?hp&_r=0

Back in February, Senator Burr joined 40 other Republican senators in killing Senator Sanders' bill to fund more support for veterans. This video clip has an extract from Burr's speech on the floor: http://www.addictinginfo.org/2014/05/25/the-one-video-everyone-needs-to-remember-on-memorial-day-video/

The Republican "concern" over deficits is hogwash. They cared nothing for deficits when they sent the troops to war while cutting taxes on the wealthiest Americans. Remember Dick Cheney gloating the Reagan proved that "deficits don't matter?"

And they have consistently refused to appropriate the funds requested by the VA even as the burden of wounded veterans on the system has drastically increased.

The real Republican agenda seems to be to privatize the VA. Send our veterans off to private health care facilities. Senator Sanders got it about right:

"The real issue here, if you look at the Koch Brothers' agenda, is: look at what many of the extreme right-wing people believe. Obamacare is just the tip of the iceberg. These people want to abolish the concept of the minimum wage, they want to privatize the Veteran's Administration, they want to privatize Social Security, end Medicare as we know it, massive cuts in Medicaid, wipe out the EPA, you don't have an Environmental Protection Agency anymore, Department of Energy gone, Department of Education gone. That is the agenda. And many people don't understand that the Koch Brothers have poured hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars into the Tea Party and two other kinds of ancillary organizations to push this agenda."

—Senator Bernie Sanders, MSNBC News (October 7, 2013) (regarding the US government shutdown of 2013).