After many days of sitting on their hands the 372nd squadron was able to carry out an important bombing raid on Wake Atoll; a base located near Midway. This important mission however was going to relentlessly push the limits of the “Flying Coffin” B-24. With flimsy high up wings and generally being a brick of a plane with common fuel and engine problems flying this contraption was a difficult job and “Admiral Chester Nimitz presented the Wake pilots with Distinguished Flying Crosses and their crewmen with Air Medals.” The mission was a smashing success and to the Americans back home these men were heroes.
“In the Honolulu Advertiser, Louie found a cartoon depicting his role in Bombing Wake. He clipped it out and tucked it in his wallet.” To my amazement this seems to be an under-emphasized passage from the book but I like it because of two reasons. The first reason being that comics were an easy way to convey messages to the general public. This comic or those around its time period had to be funny or clever to the audience. And to the military it was a quick check-in for how they were doing in the eyes of the citizens. The second reason is that this is something outside of the military that Louie is keeping on his person and I wonder if we (the reader) will see this later on. Does it hold any real significance to the plot of the book? The men of the bombing squad were being picked off by crashes and plane malfunctions more than anything. The death rates were staggering and without a body there were no funerals. So in ritual when a man never came back and was pronounced dead the men opened his footlocker and had a drink in his honor.
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