After the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, Americans were livid. As my friends Jim and Ellen recall, "We didn't like the Japanese too much after that!" Having been caught off guard, the country was itching for retribution - but how? How could the United States, with the 16th largest army in the world in 1941, possibly deliver a substantial blow to the Land of the Rising Sun? President Roosevelt asked his military advisors to "out-Pearl Harbor" Japan - he wanted Americans to bomb the enemy on their home turf, just as they had done to us. The possibility of bombing Japan had never been considered before 1941 - it was considered impossible, for a host of reasons. First, the U.S. had two types of aircraft: Land-based and carrier-based. Land-based aircraft were heavy, slow and designed to take off from long, comfortable runways. Carrier-based planes were light and small, designed to take off from and land on short-runway aircraft carriers. Carrier planes had a short range and could only carry a minimal payload. Land-based aircraft could carry more bombs, but were much too heavy to land on an aircraft carrier - their weight would crush the flight deck. Second, Japan was on alert. If an American aircraft carrier steamed within range of the Japanese homeland, the entire force would be detected and obliterated. There simply was no way to get close enough to Japan to launch carrier planes. Third, Japan was safely guarded by the sheer size of the Pacific Ocean. Folks, it is worthwhile to mention just how inconceivably huge the Pacific Ocean is, even by today's standards. It covers 28 percent of the world's surface, and is approximately 15 times larger than the U.S. There is enough room in the Pacific Ocean for every single landmass on Earth, with room to spare. In 1941, there simply was no way a land-based aircraft could fly over the Pacific to "out-Pearl Harbor" Japan. One day someone got an interesting idea - what if heavy land-based aircraft COULD take off from an aircraft carrier? If this was possible, the U.S. could send a carrier close enough to Japan; at least, close enough for long-range bombers to successfully hit the enemy. Was it possible? No one knew. The idea never has been considered. By February 1942, a volunteer force of 140 airmen was assembled and began training for a "dangerous mission," headed by aviation celebrity Jimmy Doolittle. It was not until after the aircraft carrier USS Hornet sailed past the Golden Gate Bridge and was comfortably under way that the crew was notified of its destination. As told in James Bradley's "Flyboys," "When the ships were safely out into the Pacific, the loudspeakers boomed: 'The target of this task force is Tokyo. The army is going to bomb Japan. ... This is a chance for all of us to give the Japs a dose of their own medicine.' ... Cheers filled the air. ... [A sailor remembered], 'People went wild, ... the sailors I saw were jumping up and down like small children" (Flyboys, 102). The idea was simple, but daring: the USS Hornet would get as close to Japan as she needed, in order to launch the heavy long-range bombers. Once the aircraft were airborne, the Hornet would sail back to Pearl Harbor. The bombers were scheduled to drop their payloads over Japan at sunset, then fly on to China to an airfield safely beyond Japanese control - they could not re-land on the Hornet; the aircraft were too heavy. The bomber chosen for this mission was the B-25 Mitchell, a twin-engine medium bomber that would see service in every theatre of World War II. The Mitchell was 50 feet long, had a wingspan of 67 feet, and weighed in at 14 tons. Clearly, she wasn't designed to take off from a heaving aircraft carrier. At first, nearly everything went wrong for the crew aboard the Hornet. Folks, take a second to consider how it must have felt to be part of that team: First, the carrier was spotted by an early-warning system a full 200 miles short of the intended launch point. Second, the weather had deteriorated to near-suicidal conditions; 30-foot swells were tossing the Hornet about like a cork, and the pilots would be fighting a 24-knot-headwind all the way to Japan. At this point, by launching early, the best the 16 B-25 crews could hope for was ditching their aircraft into enemy territory. As the deck heaved about and ocean spray raked the aircraft, Jimmy Doolittle made an offer to his men, "If there's any of you who don't want to go, just tell me. Because the chances of you making it back are pretty slim." No one batted an eye (Flyboys, 103). Despite gale-force winds and zero visibility, the B-25 crews fired their engines and prepared. One by one, with engines roaring, the pilots sped down the deck. They would release brakes and careen down the runway just as the Hornet was dipped into a trough, seemingly headed straight for a wall of water. The idea was to launch just as the deck reached the peak of its upward movement. All 16 B-25 Mitchells made it safely off the carrier. Engines straining, they lumbered laboriously into the sea-filled air and headed toward Japan. To be continued.

- Dan Wegmueller of Monroe writes a weekly column for Friday editions of the Times. He can be reached at dwegs@tds.net.