Word: targeted
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...clear moonlight of Thursday, pathfinder B-29s woke Tokyo up with 100-lb. oil bombs to mark the first target-Shinagawa, in the city's southeastern outskirts. Behind them thundered more than 550 bombers, the greatest force of B-29s yet used, with 4,500 tons of incendiaries. Almost two hours later, when the planes were gone, an estimated 3.2 square miles of Shinagawa, packed with freight yards, airplane-parts factories and war plants, were a raging blaze. Remarked one U.S. officer: "[It is] the most vulnerable combination of productivity, congestion and inflammability to be found anywhere in Japan...
Fire in the Wind. Less than 48 hours later, nearly 500 more B-29s returned. This time their target was farther north-the heart of modern Tokyo. While the fires from Thursday's raid still blazed, the planes dropped another 4,000 tons of gasoline jelly on the Marunouchi ("inside the castle walls") district. Said returning pilots: "Their searchlights picked us up at the coast, guided us in and took us right out to sea again . . . the toughest mission of my career. . . . Lots of Japanese came up at us right through their own flak. They were shooting down their...
...Imperial Palace, smack in Tokyo's center, was not officially a target but the 485 holy acres were in the target area and could not easily be avoided. A 70-mile ground wind, spreading the flames, apparently had even less respect for divine real estate...
This week the Army cleared the story of the B-29 Uncle Tom's Cabin, which flew to Tokyo on Dec. 27, and never returned. Other Superforts saw the Cabin, six miles above the target, rammed and ripped wide-open by a Jap fighter. Other Japs pressed in for the kill, but the staggering bomber fought them off and righted itself 3,000 feet below the formation, only to be crashed by another fighter. The Cabin pulled out again at 5,000 with one machine gun still firing; a third Jap suicide rammer sent it plummeting into Tokyo...
...target now was Tokyo. All the ships, planes, tanks, trucks, all the guns, rockets, bombs could be turned on Japan...