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00:00:30© BF-WATCH TV 2021
00:01:00© BF-WATCH TV 2021
00:01:30© BF-WATCH TV 2021
00:01:35© BF-WATCH TV 2021
00:01:40© BF-WATCH TV 2021
00:01:45Far aloft over the Atlantic seaboard, one fine morning in 1943,
00:01:50an imposing force of American naval air power proceeds to an important rendezvous.
00:01:56This force is the aircraft complement of a new carrier,
00:02:00fighters, dive bombers, torpedo bombers.
00:02:04With the air group commander leading everyone,
00:02:06they are flying out to sea to join the ship which will be their floating home and fighting base.
00:02:12He is one of many carriers which the American people have built since Pearl Harbor
00:02:16to destroy the enemy in his own part of the world, far away.
00:02:21And there now is our base, powerful and serene.
00:02:27In honor of all American aircraft carriers, let us call her the fighting lady.
00:02:50Against a good solid wind with their tail hooks down,
00:02:53our planes come into the broad flight deck of their new home.
00:03:01In case the plane's hook fails to catch the arresting gear,
00:03:04there is a series of stout wire barriers.
00:03:08Number one man on the flight deck just now is the LSO,
00:03:11the landing signal officer, always a flyer himself.
00:03:14Like all aviators, he'd much rather be flying.
00:03:20Come on in and sit down.
00:03:26The plane is out of the groove and he waves it off.
00:03:29Come around another time, pilot, and we'll take you aboard.
00:03:43When planes land, they taxi quickly forward out of the way.
00:03:47Later, they will have to be shifted to the stern
00:03:49and rearranged in proper position for takeoff.
00:03:52This is called respotting the deck.
00:03:58Here is our skipper, Jocko, a veteran Navy flyer, Annapolis, 1917.
00:04:04He is not impressed by our earnest efforts, nor the flight deck control officers.
00:04:10The skipper calls all hands together and gives us a piece of his mind.
00:04:15We'll never be ready for combat unless you flight deck crews
00:04:18learn right now to work as a team.
00:04:21Don't you men realize that before long we'll be in dangerous waters?
00:04:26That's too slow! Bear ahead!
00:04:34Watch out! Keep that wing clear!
00:04:38Get it over to starboard! Way over to starboard!
00:04:42Come on, get the lead out of your pants!
00:04:47Now this is the way your deck should look when you're ready for action.
00:04:53Our ship, our fighting lady, is enormous, wonderful, and strange to us.
00:04:58From stem to stern, the entire ship is a honeycomb
00:05:01of watertight and flame-proof compartments.
00:05:04Far below the waterline are engine rooms, fire rooms, fuel tanks,
00:05:09magazines packed with enough assorted high explosives
00:05:12to blow us all to kingdom come.
00:05:15The hangar deck is like a gigantic tunnel,
00:05:18nearly two city blocks long and wide enough
00:05:21to house four freight trains abreast.
00:05:25It'll take us a week, a month maybe, to learn our way around.
00:05:29These new surroundings are as mysterious to us
00:05:32as they are cold and impersonal.
00:05:35Our fighting lady is like a huge floating cave,
00:05:38noisy and uncomfortable.
00:05:42Elevators as big as a tennis court
00:05:44carry us topside to the flight deck.
00:05:47The great superstructure rising amid ships is called the island.
00:05:51This is truly the ship's nerve center, its fighting brain.
00:05:57Our ship is like a giant ball of fire.
00:06:00It'll take us a week, a month maybe, to learn our way around.
00:06:04This is truly the ship's nerve center, its fighting brain.
00:06:11Eighty-five percent of us who make up the fighting lady's family
00:06:14are volunteers in this war and have never been to sea before.
00:06:18We learned our jobs theoretically in intensive training ashore.
00:06:23A very short while ago we were high school boys and college kids
00:06:27or bank clerks or farmhands or factory workers.
00:06:31Now we are Blue Jackets and Marines,
00:06:34all members of a naval combat team nearly 3,000 strong.
00:06:39In our multitude of new tasks and duties as a team,
00:06:43we're very green, but curiosity and comradeship
00:06:46and the instinct of self-preservation are great teachers.
00:06:51Explosions
00:07:07Some of us have to master the delicate and complicated instruments
00:07:10which control the fire of our five-inch batteries,
00:07:13the guns that must defend the fighting lady
00:07:15when enemy dive bombers and torpedo planes attack.
00:07:20Explosions
00:07:33We train and train to learn our stuff and earn our E for efficiency.
00:07:42The fighting lady's destination is still a closely guarded secret,
00:07:46but no one can hide the fact that we are entering tropical waters.
00:07:50Our ship seems more friendly and comfortable now.
00:07:53We Greenhorns feel that a suntan will at least make us look like fighting sailors.
00:07:58Even our mascot, Scrappy, has been at sea longer than most of us.
00:08:09Some of the mystery that has been hanging over us
00:08:11is lifted when we enter the Panama Canal.
00:08:14There is a lot of unprofessional nervousness
00:08:16about whether or not we're too big to get through the locks.
00:08:19By using lines instead of fenders, we do get through.
00:08:22As the naval constructors knew all along, we would.
00:08:25Come on, hop aboard. We're going places.
00:08:27For a few cents I would. Do you know anybody who wants to swap?
00:08:35Now we stand out into the Pacific,
00:08:37and life aboard settles down into monotony.
00:08:40Here are our aircraft pilots, officers all.
00:08:43Ship's company call them the glamour boys.
00:08:46They are the men who fly and fight our planes.
00:08:49All the efforts of all the rest of us are concentrated
00:08:52on putting these people into the air and getting them back again.
00:08:56Most of us are hiding a certain amount of nervousness and anxiety.
00:09:00Many of us are Johnny-come-latelys,
00:09:02reserve officers who only recently learned to fly at Corpus Christi in Jacksonville.
00:09:07Others among us are specialists who trained at Quonset Point, Rhode Island.
00:09:13Reserves are called by the regulars, in a friendly way, 90-day wonders.
00:09:19In return, the Annapolis regulars are called the trade school boys.
00:09:23But whether Quonset or Annapolis, all are bound together in the fraternity,
00:09:27the close fellowship of Navy men.
00:09:38Among the ship's non-commissioned personnel,
00:09:40almost 3,000 Blue Jackets and 100 Marines,
00:09:43the hottest shots are the air crewmen, aerial gunners and radio men.
00:09:49These boys and the plane captains are the partners of the glamour boys in the air.
00:09:54By non-flying Blue Jackets, they are called zoom pigeons or airdales.
00:09:59Because they receive 50% extra pay for flying,
00:10:03they are sometimes referred to as the bankroll boys.
00:10:11Everybody aboard ship backs up the flying group.
00:10:15This requires the efforts of all manner of people.
00:10:19Many of the jobs are far from glamorous.
00:10:22All the little tasks and services you find along Main Street
00:10:26must be performed by some members of our carrier's crew.
00:10:30For though the fighting lady is a powerful ship of war,
00:10:33she is also a sizable American community.
00:10:36Her population must be supplied with all the necessities
00:10:39and some of the comforts of home.
00:10:50Doc Sorensen, the pharmacist's mate, is just like a village druggist.
00:10:55Next door is our hospital called Sick Bay.
00:10:58It has only a few patients now, but soon it is to be filled with our wounded.
00:11:04Men like these who perform the humble jobs that make life
00:11:07aboard a fighting carrier more bearable,
00:11:10the barbers and the cobblers are seldom mentioned in communiques.
00:11:14They all have a place in our fighting team.
00:11:20Weeks pass.
00:11:22Now we are far out into the Pacific, which is a very considerable body of water.
00:11:27Monotony shuts down on us between our duties.
00:11:30Guessing where we're bound is still our chief pastime.
00:11:34Will we put in to Pearl?
00:11:36Are we going to Iron Bottom Bay?
00:11:38Or maybe even to the Aleutians?
00:11:41All such gossip and rumor are called scuttlebutt
00:11:44or drinking fountain conversation.
00:11:58Throughout the ship, men get together in little groups to take refuge
00:12:02from the heavy burden of waiting for something to happen.
00:12:11And then one day out of nowhere comes a fast fleet tanker
00:12:14and we are refueled at sea.
00:12:16This tells us something.
00:12:18This tells us that we are not going to Pearl or any other landing site.
00:12:22This tells us something.
00:12:24This tells us that we are not going to Pearl or any other land base
00:12:27for a long, long time.
00:12:38Besides our skipper, we have an admiral aboard,
00:12:41a sea dog who's been a naval flyer for nearly 20 years.
00:12:45Until now, only these officers have known where we are to go.
00:12:50But now Jocko, our captain, confers with the air group commander
00:12:54and reveals the plan.
00:12:56A fighting lady has been ordered to make a strike.
00:12:59She will pass through waters where no carrier task force
00:13:02has ventured since the bloody Battle of Midway.
00:13:05Remember, this is 1943, long before we took the Marshall Islands.
00:13:11Weather studies are made, and though this is a daily routine,
00:13:15somehow the whole ship senses that something is about to happen.
00:13:19Even before the news is broadcast to all of us,
00:13:22there's a new tension and atmosphere of expectancy.
00:13:27And then we are told we have traveled more than 7,000 miles from Panama
00:13:31so that tomorrow, August 30th, 1943,
00:13:35we can strike the Jap base at Marcus Island,
00:13:38deep within the enemy's ring of defenses.
00:13:45The evening before our first strike, the air group commander
00:13:48briefs all his pilots with maps and the model of our target.
00:13:52We are sticking out our necks to within 1,000 miles of Tokyo
00:13:55to divert the Japs' attention from other American activities
00:13:58far south and east of Marcus.
00:14:01Those of us who have never before been in battle,
00:14:04that's most of us,
00:14:06ask a lot of questions of those who have seen action.
00:14:09Don't break off until you're practically on the same course
00:14:12and right astern of the enemy. Then push over fast.
00:14:15Outwardly, we try to seem composed and cheerful,
00:14:18but a lot's going on inside our minds.
00:14:21We question our most inner selves.
00:14:24What will it be like?
00:14:26How will we take it? Will we do all right?
00:14:31This is the night when a lot of boys write one more letter home.
00:14:36Among those playing Acey Deucey in the wardroom
00:14:39is a chubby 23-year-old from Eureka Springs, Arkansas,
00:14:43Lieutenant E.T. Stover, nicknamed Smokey.
00:14:47That's he sitting on the far right.
00:14:50Having flown 50 missions at Guadalcanal,
00:14:53Smokey has been ordered to take a rest.
00:14:56He'd much rather be flying.
00:15:00Before dark on the eve of battle,
00:15:03our planes are loaded with bombs and gas.
00:15:06So that each plane will be in its precise position
00:15:09for a speedy takeoff, we spot and re-spot our deck.
00:15:16Now all is perfect.
00:15:19We will strike at dawn.
00:15:24And now GQ, general quarters.
00:15:34...
00:15:42Every man on the ship goes to his battle station,
00:15:45his special place on the fighting team.
00:15:48George, the barber, will pass ammunition.
00:15:51Leo, the baker, will be a sky lookout.
00:15:54Frank, the tailor, is assigned to a first aid station.
00:15:58Pilots are in their ready rooms.
00:16:01Each squadron, fighter, bomber, torpedo bomber,
00:16:04assemble separately.
00:16:07Flyers get into their flight gear and receive
00:16:10last-minute data and instructions.
00:16:23On the flight deck, our first battle dawn awaits us.
00:16:27Our whole ship is on hair trigger.
00:16:30The fighting lady is hardly 100 miles
00:16:33from the first target of her career.
00:16:36These last few minutes before the order for our first action
00:16:39are the toughest time of all.
00:16:49A wise man once said,
00:16:52war is mostly waiting.
00:16:55I don't know what that can mean.
00:16:58At last the word comes.
00:17:01Pilots, man your planes.
00:17:04Ready room three, roger. Pilots, man your planes.
00:17:25♪♪
00:17:28♪♪
00:17:31♪♪
00:17:34♪♪
00:17:37♪♪
00:17:40♪♪
00:17:43♪♪
00:17:46The fighters take off first to form cover aloft
00:17:49for the other squadrons.
00:17:52Heavy laden with destruction.
00:17:55♪♪
00:17:58♪♪
00:18:01♪♪
00:18:04The sun has risen now
00:18:07and our escorts are alert for enemy submarines.
00:18:10But the fighting lady steams boldly
00:18:13toward our target to lessen the distance
00:18:16for our planes when they return.
00:18:19♪♪
00:18:22♪♪
00:18:25♪♪
00:18:28The radio plotting room is the electric eye and ear
00:18:31by which the fighting lady detects and keeps tab
00:18:34on all planes and ships for miles around us.
00:18:37Smokey, the fighting ace from Arkansas,
00:18:40has been put in charge of this room for our big day.
00:18:43Hunched among his assistants,
00:18:46Smokey is like a super quarterback
00:18:49on a super football team.
00:18:52He is in constant touch with our entire air group.
00:18:55♪♪
00:18:58As our first fighters race in
00:19:01toward Marcus Island, they stay low
00:19:04hoping to escape detection by the enemy's radar.
00:19:07Then they climb suddenly and dive
00:19:10in a surprise strafing attack on the enemy's airstrips.
00:19:13These red balls floating up at us so lazily
00:19:16are anti-aircraft fire.
00:19:19There is three times as much of it coming up at us
00:19:22as we can see because only one shell in three is a tracer.
00:19:25What look like fiery polywogs are tracers
00:19:28from our own wing guns.
00:19:31The AK-X is much heavier than expected,
00:19:34but through it we go to knock out enemy bombers on the ground.
00:19:37All through these battle pictures realize
00:19:40that we are looking straight down our own gun barrels.
00:19:43These pictures are taken automatically
00:19:46by the same mechanism that operates the guns.
00:19:49Pictures even shake with the guns recoiled.
00:19:52Our eye is now the very eye of our fighting airplane.
00:19:55♪♪
00:19:58♪♪
00:20:01♪♪
00:20:04The enemy's picket boats and supply ships
00:20:07offshore are thoroughly strafed.
00:20:10No longer will these traps bring rice and sake
00:20:13and munitions to mark us.
00:20:16♪♪
00:20:19♪♪
00:20:22♪♪
00:20:25♪♪
00:20:28Our bombers flying higher see the island beginning to burn.
00:20:31A moment ago it looked like a little jade trinket
00:20:34in a cobalt sea.
00:20:40As the fighters and bombers swing victoriously
00:20:43away from Marcus Island,
00:20:46towering columns of smoke show the thorough job
00:20:49our boys have done.
00:20:52Back aboard ship,
00:20:55Smokey is tracking the flyers with care
00:20:58to be sure that none is missing
00:21:01and that no enemy planes are trying to follow them out
00:21:04to our fighting lady.
00:21:10♪♪
00:21:13♪♪
00:21:16♪♪
00:21:19♪♪
00:21:22As our planes come aboard, there begins an operation
00:21:25almost as exciting as the attack itself.
00:21:28It's the after battle with the plane directors as dancing masters.
00:21:31The whirling propellers fill this scene with danger
00:21:34but now our crews are trained and adept.
00:21:37♪♪
00:21:40♪♪
00:21:43♪♪
00:21:46♪♪
00:21:49♪♪
00:21:52The landing signal officer performs an eloquent adagio
00:21:55on the fighting lady's stern.
00:21:58A warning to the rest of the cast to stay off stage
00:22:01until a limping member can be let out of the way.
00:22:05♪♪
00:22:08♪♪
00:22:11♪♪
00:22:14♪♪
00:22:20♪♪
00:22:23The pilots go below to report to their combat intelligence officers.
00:22:36They have hot news, good news.
00:22:38They tell what they saw and did, how many rounds of ammunition they fired, how many
00:22:43bombs they dropped, what they hit, what they noticed at the target that was new and different
00:22:49or that may need hitting again.
00:22:52As the reports are added up and our combat photographers develop their pictures, the
00:22:57story becomes better and better.
00:23:00Every single Jap bomber on Marcus has been destroyed.
00:23:03Eighty percent of the shore installations blasted or set afire.
00:23:07Hangars, radio stations, gas dumps, ammunition dumps.
00:23:12Marcus is now a lovely mess.
00:23:16In the radio plot, Smokey is worried.
00:23:18There are planes still up there and he's wondering about them.
00:23:22They are ours though, delayed by battle damage.
00:23:28Landing a shot up plane on the carrier is a crucial test of how well trained, how alert
00:23:34and steady a naval flyer is.
00:23:53The fighting lady now has met her enemy.
00:23:56In the ward room, the pilots who this morning felt new and nervous now talk like veterans.
00:24:02We have been baptized by fire and have survived nicely.
00:24:06We of the fighting lady are growing up.
00:24:13The admiral of our task force knows the overall strategy of the whole Pacific campaign.
00:24:18To smash straight through Japan's outer network of islands, to recapture the Philippines and
00:24:22land on the mainland of Asia.
00:24:24Thus, we will deny Japan supplies from Malaya and the Dutch East Indies and leave her far-flung
00:24:30island garrisons maroon.
00:24:32Then we will reach out and really help our ally, China.
00:24:37Months after Marcus, this campaign is well started.
00:24:40Our carrier task forces have been in many battles.
00:24:44Now, early in 1944, the fighting lady's target is Kwajalein, the Marshall Islands.
00:24:52These are Jap zeros, fighter screen being pierced by our planes and planes from eight
00:24:58other carriers, preparatory to strafing Kwajalein and bombing it apart.
00:25:03Our fighter pilots have improved with practice, with the confidence that comes from experience.
00:25:11They estimate their range by watching their tracers.
00:25:14They hold their fire until our wing gun bullets converge at 300 yards.
00:25:21They shoot in bursts instead of in steady streams, which heat up the guns and spend
00:25:26ammunition.
00:26:01We soon have Kwajalein burning very satisfactorily.
00:26:21After our bombing attacks and heavy shelling by our surface ships, assault craft filled
00:26:26with Marines and Army hit the beaches.
00:26:29And very soon after that, Kwajalein is ours.
00:26:48Right after Kwajalein, word comes to our admiral that a truck, Japan's huge and secret naval
00:26:53fortress 1,400 miles to the west, there apparently are some heavy units of the Japanese battle
00:26:59fleet.
00:27:00Perhaps we can surprise them.
00:27:03Again, the fighting lady's squadron and squadrons from other carriers take off for combat.
00:27:09A lot of mouths are dry at the thought that our target is mighty truck.
00:27:19The rear seat gunners look back at the fighting lady wondering when and if they will ever
00:27:24return to her.
00:27:33All that we know about truck, we know from a few photographs taken by some nervy Marines
00:27:38on reconnaissance just 18 days ago.
00:27:40We hear that it is a complex of heavily fortified islands surrounded by airstrips with naval
00:27:47anchorages at certain spots among the islands.
00:27:51For the next two days, more than 1,000 of our carrier-based planes are going to sweep
00:27:57in on truck in relays.
00:28:00The planes appear to flow gently off our bow.
00:28:04Actually, their airspeed is a good 70 knots.
00:28:08Diving in on truck, we again turn on our guns and their synchronized cameras.
00:28:13The Japanese defenders are aloft and we smack them hard.
00:28:43The hearts that were in men's mouths before this strike began now settle back into place
00:28:48and are singing once more.
00:28:51There's something really grand, something historic about diving in here on this place
00:28:56which Japan has been building and guarding jealously from all the Japanese eyes for 20
00:29:02years.
00:29:03We dive right in low and take a good look at fighter strips, bomber bases, seaplane
00:29:08ramps.
00:29:18In an almost vertical dive, the pilot may black out or go blind for a moment when he
00:29:23pulls up and out at the bottom, but the camera won't black out.
00:29:28It cannot see the landing of our own bomb, for we'll be up and away before that reaches
00:29:32the target.
00:29:33But it records the hits of other planes ahead of us.
00:30:03We'd hoped to find the Jap fleet here, but most of it's gone.
00:30:21Some lingering ships, including some of their vast fleet tankers, we find hiding in sheltered
00:30:26coves.
00:30:28The vessels which we are now strafing are other fleet auxiliaries, rice boats, transports,
00:30:34and ammunition ships.
00:30:41With bursts of .50 caliber incendiaries and armor-piercing slugs, we set them on fire,
00:30:46rip them open, often wide enough to sink.
00:31:07Strafing ships filled with TNT is not very healthy for pilots who dive too low, but it's
00:31:35hard to tell who's carrying what until the big bang comes.
00:31:54Returning to the deck at 130 miles an hour with a flap shot away, all a pilot can hope
00:31:59to save is his own skin.
00:32:02Here comes our new air group commander.
00:32:05He's had a bit of trouble.
00:32:07His windshield is blotted with blood, and he has to feel his way aboard.
00:32:12Strafing at low altitude, he took a 40-millimeter anti-aircraft burst right in the face.
00:32:17More than 200 wounds, and his plane a sail.
00:32:22He'll live to fly again.
00:32:25Some planes will not return, but others come back and land somehow, anyhow.
00:32:32Considering the toughness of Truk, our losses are astonishingly light.
00:32:37No time is lost getting casualties below.
00:32:49It's a long way from Truk to our secret rendezvous in the Marshall Islands.
00:32:53Someday it can be told just where this is.
00:32:56Actually, it is a magnificent new fleet anchorage, an advanced naval base, which we have taken
00:33:01from the Japs and made secure.
00:33:06Now for the first time, we, who have been operating as separate, relatively small task
00:33:11forces, see assemble the enormous mass of naval power.
00:33:16Over one million tons of American fighting steel.
00:33:19New carriers, new battleships, new cruisers, and fleet auxiliaries in an amount which Japan
00:33:25could never conceive, let alone produce.
00:33:33That we are able to maintain supply lines over the vast distances of the Pacific is
00:33:38one of the miracles of this war.
00:33:40In the comforting presence of so much power, we relax and refresh our battle-strained nerves.
00:33:47Our ship's post office now does really big business.
00:34:07Letters for us at last from home.
00:34:10Letters from us to friends and families.
00:34:13Our sensors know our collective mood, our central hopes and thoughts.
00:34:21The stuff is really getting out here now.
00:34:26I can't tell you much about it, but oh boy.
00:34:31And the more we get, well, the sooner I'll be seeing you.
00:34:38All hands are called together.
00:34:41Our old skipper, Jocko, has been promoted admiral.
00:34:44Our new one's name is Dixie.
00:34:45Man, as soon as I finish talking, we are getting underway.
00:34:51Our fighting lady is now part of what is designated Task Force 58.
00:34:55As you know, our final destination is a place called Tokyo.
00:35:00We'll have to fight hard to get there, but when we drop our hook at Yokohama, I'm going
00:35:05to throw a party.
00:35:07All hands are cordially invited.
00:35:33Our task forces are built compactly now around carriers like ourselves, with speedy new battle
00:35:38wagons at our side.
00:35:40A carrier skipper never leaves the bridge at sea, because carriers and their planes
00:35:46are the first to strike the enemy or to be struck by him.
00:35:52Our aircraft pilots are constantly on call, for despite the massive power spread out around
00:35:57us, these are still dangerous waters.
00:36:00Our pilots know this all too well, but it doesn't worry them now for their season.
00:36:04They know how.
00:36:06There are a lot of new faces among us, but most of these men, too, have been in action
00:36:12at places like Hollandia, Millie, Jollywood, Palau, Rabaul, Wake, Meloilap.
00:36:22Our rear seat gunners and radio men are old hands now.
00:36:25Some of their faces are different, too, because there have been replacements.
00:36:29A lot of them have been made commissioned officers.
00:36:36There's a saying in the Navy that you never learn to love a carrier until she gets hurt.
00:36:41Well, perhaps we don't really love our fighting lady, but we've become mighty fond of her
00:36:47and almost comfortable, almost at home.
00:36:56Today our shipboard movies bring us that one thing we crave the most, one touch of
00:37:00something utterly American, one deep breath of home.
00:37:18Like Jocko, our new skipper, Dixie, is an old hell-diving Navy pilot.
00:37:22In their battle camps, he and Admiral Mitcher look like big league baseball managers.
00:37:31Northwest we steam and never before in history has an ocean borne such a weight of naval
00:37:36power.
00:37:38Not a gentleman, not a Japan's proud boast, Tsushima, was there anywhere near the force
00:37:43with which we now assert that this is our ocean, this is our air, and we're seeking
00:37:49the Japanese battle fleet to prove it.
00:38:02With our cruisers and our biggest new battle wagons present, we are strong enough to hope,
00:38:08daily to hope, that we may provoke the Japanese fleet into accepting a fight.
00:38:21We're joined by plotting Coast Guard and Navy transports, the Marines again, so another
00:38:28amphibious assault is cooking.
00:38:33Uh-oh, our patrols have spotted an enemy search plane and are after her.
00:38:40She's a big bird, a 20-ton, four-motored Kawanishi seaplane, the kind we call Emily's.
00:39:00Yes, Emily's a tough old girl.
00:39:03Right now she's screaming for help and telling Tokyo by radio where we are.
00:39:09Hellcats are closing in on her.
00:39:23So long, Emily.
00:39:36Now that the enemy knows where we are, and we know he knows, our brass hats get together
00:39:41on final arrangements for what may turn into another midway.
00:39:47Our objective, first of many in our drive through to the Philippines and China, will
00:39:52be the Marianas.
00:39:56In battles just ahead of us, we are to make good use of a multitude of weapons, special
00:40:00devices and techniques which have been evolved through the 30 years since the U.S. Navy first
00:40:06took to the air.
00:40:13Not only did our naval flyers create the aircraft carrier itself, but it was they who devised
00:40:19the torpedo plane and invented and perfected dive bombing.
00:40:35Disposed about our flight deck so that planes can be quickly armed are all manner of death-dealing
00:40:40objects, 500, 1,000 and 2,000-pound bombs.
00:40:46We have torpedoes and incendiaries, and the kind of anti-personnel bombs we call daisy
00:40:52cutters.
00:41:02Some of our bombs are armor-piercing, some for fragmentation.
00:41:06Others have delayed action fuses to prolong the effect of our bombardment for hours after
00:41:11we have delivered it.
00:41:15Here are the new rockets, which pack the same wallop as a three-inch shell.
00:41:19They weigh little, and because there isn't much recoil, they can be fired from planes.
00:41:25On the eve of battle, we are told to scrub up to lessen the danger of infection in case
00:41:29we're wounded.
00:41:44As well as our bodies, most of us prepare our souls.
00:41:56Always on the eve of battle, divine services are held in relays so that every one of our
00:42:01Fighting Lady's 3,000 sons has a chance to attend.
00:42:22As the eve before battle lengthens, there is the usual waiting.
00:42:26Again we're reminded that war is mostly waiting.
00:42:44Because all cooks and bakers must soon be at their battle stations, they work all night
00:42:47long preparing a hearty meal of steak and eggs for our 3 a.m. battle breakfast.
00:43:04We're being attacked.
00:43:11We're being attacked by Japanese torpedo planes skimming in after us, wing to water.
00:43:25All they want is one hit on our flight deck.
00:43:27We have nearly 90 planes fueled and loaded with bombs ready for the takeoff.
00:43:47Each patch of flame is a burning Jap.
00:44:05In this surprise attack, 19 Japs are polished off by our ship's batteries.
00:44:10Not a single carrier is hit.
00:44:14We have been fortunate.
00:44:16So now commences another major moment in the Fighting Lady's career, flight quarter sounds.
00:44:23In this, modern warfare, the young plane captains are to their pilots what squires were to armored
00:44:30knights of old.
00:44:33In this operation, typical of many more to come, a lot of other Fighting Ladies will
00:44:39be involved.
00:44:40And nearly 2,000 carrier-based planes, all of them attacking in air groups like our own.
00:45:02From now on, we tighten our belts and steady our hands as our Navy makes progressively
00:45:07bigger attacks nearer and nearer the heart of Japan.
00:45:21At his post and radio plot, tracking down enemy planes and cursing the luck that keeps
00:45:25him out of the air, Smokey chafes at being grounded on a day like this, especially when
00:45:31targets are juicy ones.
00:45:34All the Jap air bases and military installations in the Marianas and a special prize package,
00:45:41Guam, the island which we did not fortify, but the Japs did.
00:45:48Now comes word that the Japs have sent strong air reinforcements to Tinian, which flanks
00:45:52Guam.
00:45:54Again, our synchronized cameras record, as no human eye and memory could record, just
00:46:03what our guns and bombs do to the enemy.
00:46:10These pictures enable our air combat intelligence officers to assess the damage as we swoop
00:46:15down upon Tinian.
00:47:15While our planes return for more fuel and ammunition, the service vessels take over.
00:47:40A prodigious naval barrage to prepare the beaches our assault forces are going to hit.
00:47:48Not only our newest, but some of our oldest and proudest battleships are here.
00:47:52The Colorado, the Tennessee, and the USS Pennsylvania, flagship of World War I.
00:48:08Bringing home to the fighting lady several of our planes crippled, make a game attempt
00:48:12to land.
00:48:17Now is when the landing signal officer must judge not only the speed, but estimate the
00:48:21battle damage of planes like these.
00:48:35Flight deck emergency crews, firefighters, rescue details, and medical corpsmen exhibit
00:48:41almost incredible courage.
00:49:03The pilot of a torpedo plane has been unable to release his load of incendiaries.
00:49:08Burning thermite is spilling out at incandescent heat.
00:49:10In the plane's tanks remain about 75 gallons of high octane gas.
00:49:17The men who brave this danger to save pilot and crew deserve every citation they get.
00:49:36In the ready rooms, intelligence officers question battle-weary pilots.
00:49:42What did you see?
00:49:44Any Jap carriers in sight?
00:49:46Are you sure they were carrier-based planes?
00:49:51Then from radio plot comes uncomfortable news.
00:49:54Torpedo planes and dive bombers from enemy aircraft carriers are approaching.
00:49:58All hands, man your battle stations.
00:50:03To our engine room, go orders for flank speed, which is a few knots faster than full speed,
00:50:09in case we need to take evasive action.
00:50:14All boilers are lighted to let the fighting lady outdo herself if necessary.
00:50:18The engine room people turn on the heat, and the propeller shafts churn like fate in their
00:50:23alleys.
00:50:32The fighting lady leaps through the sea on her guard.
00:50:42Skipper Dixie gears himself for action, and so does wise old Scrappy.
00:50:51Now, here they come.
00:51:21A Jap Jill, torpedo bomber, miraculously keeps coming through our wall of flak.
00:51:50She's approaching us fast with a life that must be charmed.
00:51:54Our gunners throw everything they've got, but still she comes.
00:51:59If he ever releases that torpedo...
00:52:09She missed us.
00:52:10Either the pilot was already dead, or his release gear jammed.
00:52:21When Smokey, the pride of Arkansas, hears about that one, he almost takes off.
00:52:29Now our reconnaissance has spotted the Japanese task forces.
00:52:32This is the moment we've been fighting and praying for.
00:52:36Every plane that can fly and every qualified pilot is ordered into the air.
00:52:40At last, Smokey gets his chance to fly again.
00:52:44Pilots, man your planes.
00:52:46Pilots, man your planes.
00:53:06The Philippine trade wind is tearing down our flight deck.
00:53:19Our planes strain forward to rise into it.
00:53:23Our entire air group thunders out behind the group commander.
00:53:28Now our fighters run into a smooth Jap fighters, mostly Zeros, sent up to intercept our attack
00:53:35on the Japanese fleet.
00:53:37A mad aerial scramble begins, which the boys to this day still call the Marianas Turkey
00:53:43shoot.
00:53:44369 Jap planes are shot down in this single day, to our loss of 22.
00:53:55Japanese plane makers have sacrificed strength and firepower for agility.
00:54:00Their planes disintegrate quickly when you hit them.
00:54:02They have no armor plate as ours have, nor are their gas tanks self-sealing.
00:54:14These little monkeys are fancy flyers.
00:54:17They think aerobatics can win dogfights, whereas we believe in smooth flying and careful shooting.
00:55:32And now, at last, through a late afternoon haze from high altitude, our air combat group
00:55:43sights the Imperial Japanese battle fleet.
00:55:46These are the first pictures ever taken of a great enemy naval formation like this.
00:55:59There it is, that Imperial fleet, crawling around below us in violent, evasive action.
00:56:06Us, looking down on them in the seas they think they own.
00:56:13Some of these Japanese ships are scampering away at better than 40 knots.
00:56:18When you bore straight down on them, they twist, squirm.
00:56:22We engage a big destroyer at the bow, hoping to shoot out his bridge, and he shoots back
00:56:4920.
00:56:56Let's go down after that cruiser.
00:56:58He answers us emphatically from a forward turret.
00:57:19Now, a 25,000-ton Jap carrier of the Hayataka class is going to get it.
00:57:30Watch five o'clock in the camera, the lower right-hand corner of the screen.
00:57:34This big flattop gets it where the turkey got the ax.
00:57:49When you touch off some of these babies, just watch this one.
00:58:06And now we come home from the Battle of the Philippine Sea.
00:58:10Seventeen Jap warships have been sunk or severely damaged.
00:58:14Several of our returning planes have been badly shot up.
00:58:19A dive bomber comes in out of gas.
00:58:24He pulls off to starboard, but nose is over because his wheels are down.
00:58:37This pilot has 73 holes in his plane, and his leg almost shot away.
00:58:57To clear the deck for other planes, number 30, badly damaged, is jettisoned, given the deep six.
00:59:08Watch carefully.
00:59:10This man's controls are all but shot away.
00:59:25He steps out of it smartly.
00:59:32And now it is time to paint up the scores.
00:59:34On this fine morning, just a year after being commissioned,
00:59:38the fighting lady is beginning to look like a stamp album.
00:59:44She has done her share, amassing Task Force 58's grand total of 757 Jap aircraft destroyed
00:59:52in a two-week turkey shoot.
01:00:04But there's another score to add up, our own casualties.
01:00:10Quite a few faces are no longer with us on the fighting lady.
01:00:14Among them, Commander Upson, skipper of our torpedo squadron.
01:00:20Lieutenant Pappy Condit.
01:00:23Lieutenant John Meehan.
01:00:28And that fighting is gentleman, Lieutenant Smokey Stover.
01:00:32Yes, Smokey's missing too.
01:00:41Salute them under their country's flag.
01:00:45For they were brave.
01:00:47They were gallant.
01:00:49Others will come forward to take their places.
01:00:53For the battles we have fought on the seas and in the sky are only the beginning.
01:00:58Still hungry for battle will steam our carrier, serene, powerful, unafraid.
01:01:06She and her planes will come home again someday, God grant, but not until the bitter glorious end.
01:01:14For she is, and we salute her, the fighting lady.