Doolittle Raid

choi

Kirk Johnson, Raiding Japan on Fumes in 1942, and Surviving to Tell How Fliers Did It. New York Times, Feb 2, 2014
www.nytimes.com/2014/02/02/us/ra ... -fliers-did-it.html

Quote:

On April 18, 1942, "just a few grim months after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor * * * The Doolittle Raiders, as they became known — 80 men in 16 bombers led by a swashbuckling lieutenant colonel, James H Doolittle— launched themselves over the Pacific from the aircraft carrier Hornet, aiming to strike at Japan when few thought it could be done, at least with any hope of survival. * * *  the industrial waterfront at Kobe, their target

"He and his crew had to ditch their B-25 off the Chinese coast after it ran out of gas * * * they found that their only Chinese phrase, 'We’re Americans,' had been taught to them in the wrong dialect. A fisherman saved them, hiding them under mats on his boat, and a 14-year-old orphan became their guide and scrounger of food in the subsequent weeks as they evaded Japanese patrols on the mainland. The boy disappeared in the chaos of the war without a trace, Mr Saylor said. 'I was going to bring him home with me,' he said. 'We owed him.'

"Mr Saylor’s wife learned he was alive from watching a newsreel about the raiders that included scenes of him receiving a medal from Madame Chiang Kai-shek, the wife of the Chinese leader.

"Until their mission, no big land-based bomber had ever taken off into combat from an aircraft carrier.

"Unlike the specialized elite teams that are typically honed for dangerous, high-profile missions in today’s military, Colonel Doolittle’s fliers were mostly enlisted men and officers with ordinary training who had raised their hands at a time of national crisis and volunteered to go.

Note:
(a) What does the title mean?

Compare
fume (n):
"[definition] 3: a state of excited irritation or anger —usually used in the phrase in a fume
* * *
[idiom] — on fumes
:  with little of the original strength or energy remaining <tired ballplayers running on fumes>"
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fume
(b) Enumclaw, Washington
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enumclaw,_Washington
(The name Enumclaw is derived from a Salish Native American term)
(c) The English surname Saylor: "from Old French sailleor ‘dancer’, ‘leaper’"
(d) North American B-25 Mitchell
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_B-25_Mitchell
(1941-1878 (retired by Indonesia); manufactured by North American Aviation [1928-1996]; The B-25 was named in honor of General Billy Mitchell [1879-1936; regarded as the father of the US Air Force])
(e) "The 1944 movie 'Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo' captured the seat-of-the-pants brio of fliers and their mission.

brio (n; Italian):
"enthusiastic vigor: VIVACITY; VERVE"
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/brio
(f) "his sentences crisp"

crisp (adj): "concise and to the point <a crisp reply>"
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/crisp