American POWs of Japan is a research project of Asia Policy Point, a Washington, DC-based nonprofit that studies the US policy relationship with Japan and Northeast Asia. The project aims to educate Americans on the history of the POW experience both during and after World War II and its effect on the U.S.-Japan Alliance.
On April 18, 1942, 16 B-25 bombers took off from the aircraft carrier USS Hornet to attack Tokyo and other Japanese cities. The Hornet became infamous in POW history for its planes sinking Hell ships carrying hundreds of American POWs. The famous Doolittle Raid lifted American morale in the early days of the Second World War, and while it inflicted very little damage, there were unexpected consequences.
Eight men were captured by the Japanese, three of them were executed, one starved to death in a prisoner of war camp; the other four survived until the end of the war, forever broken from the torture they endured.
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The rest of Doolittle’s raiders made it back to Allied lines with the help of Chinese villagers and missionaries. In retaliation, Japanese forces killed an estimated 250,000 Chinese, an atrocity on the scale of the infamous Rape of Nanking.
Released on the eve (February 1944) of the beginning of the American strategic bombing campaign of Japan (June 1944), The Purple Heart, is a film portraying the imagined fate of the eight members of a Doolittle Raid bomber crew that were captured by the Japanese of which three were executed and one died of starvation. The Doolittle Raiders were awarded a Congressional Gold Medal this year.
The movie is recalled for having one of the most inspiring endings in a WWII film, Capt. Harvey Ross (Dana Andrews) addresses his Japanese accusers (who look jarringly and inappropriately like Chinese Fu Manchu caricatures) with a defiant speech predicting Japan's coming devastation. Capt. Ross tells the Japanese that Americans do not give up.
The judges condemn the accused pilots to death, and they proudly march to their destiny, as the US Air Force's theme Wild Blue Yonder plays in a rousing rendition. It is likely the message was as much for the American audiences as it was to impress upon the Germans and Japanese of American determination.
In the movie, General Ito Mitsubi said "We will win this war because we are willing to sacrifice ten million lives. How many lives is the white man willing to sacrifice?" Well, the answer is we don't have to, we have better technology.
