History, World War II
The Japanese Balloon Bombs — World’s First Intercontinental Bombers
A battle for bombs, balloons and bio-weapons
Source: Wikimedia
By 1944, the Japanese were desolate to find a way to fight back the Allied powers. America attack had the Japenese army destroyed, the navy was pushed back and the only hope was air attacks.
However, the problem was that the aerial combat and warfare was far too expensive. Also, the Axis powers were cash strapped; the development and purchase of fighter planes and bombers was not an option in the last days of the war.
Titled ‘Project Fu-Go’, Japan resorted to a surprisingly inexpensive, low-tech strategy to conduct attacks on American soil. They developed thousands of air balloons strapped with bombs to attack American civilians and cause forest fires across the eastern coast. The motive was to cause confusion and disrupt the American war effort thus providing the Japanese with some breathing room from the American war machine. The US deployed nearly three thousand soldiers on call to fight balloon-ignited fires.
