Two Blunders

摘要

Commander Fuchida Mitsuo hunched down in the centre seat of his Nakajima B5N Kate attack bomber as he led 178 aircraft searching for an island in the pre-dawn gloom. The objective was Oahu, in the Hawaiian chain; the date December 7, 1941. On Oahu was the state capital, Honolulu and, more specifically, Pearl Harbor, home of the US Navy's Pacific Fleet. At 1,000ft to the north of Pearl Harbor the air was cold and humid. The horizon was obscured by dark tropical cumulus clouds. Fuchida worried about making a proper landfall after navigating more than 200 miles (321 km) in uncertain winds over a dull grey ocean devoid of navigational waypoints. He kept an anxious eye on the fighters. They had never flown against a target more than 100 miles from their launch point.