THe evidence is clear that prizes achieve 33-100 times more per $ thyan conventional government spending whenn they work (& infinitely more, since nothing is paid, when they don’t – and since Apollo, how many government programmes worked as promised?

That is just plain wrong. It helped change the moral on both sides. Gen. Petraus will gladly tell you the importance of that.

Four squadrons of planes were pulled from the front and sat idle on Japan, how much more damage could have been caused if they had stayed on the front lines?

There was a strategic difference in the Japanese high command. Yamamota said take out the Americans, Nagomo said take out Australia & India and the Army generals want china. The Doolittle raid said Yamamota was correct and it made for the attack on Midway, which allowed for the breaking of their codes and our ability to sink their carriers.

“. After the declaration of war the empire could only retrench, as the rational Japanese leadership knew.”

More Oddball. The rest of your post is valuless you dont seem to understand that “rational” leadership was not running Japan…goofy leadership was much like Bush 43 and his klutzs

RGO

NO and that you do not know the difference speaks volumes.

Put up or shut up time again, Oler. List the differences.

It worked? Such parlor games had no effect on the outcome of the war. Japan was already over extended before the war started. There was no ‘next thing’. After the declaration of war the empire could only retrench, as the rational Japanese leadership knew.

The Doolittle Raid was one of many inaccuracies and unforced errors made by a war US leadership with tarnished credibility. It was a wholly symbolic attack of no strategic value designed by FDR to manipulate public opinion, already solidly behind the war. In retrospect the US strategic plan could not lose. Use an ever increasing advantage in men, material, and Navy forces to constrict an over extended, supplied aggressor. Our advantages multiplied with time – like chess game where one side’s pieces multiply while the other’s dwindled.

The shocked reaction that any kind of raid on Japan happened at all (no matter how little the destruction) shook their confidence to such an extent that it caused them to hold back a larger percentage of their forces to protect the homeland.

Even more important, it put the operation to sieze Midway Island on the fast track . . .

@Oler:

Andrew can answer for himself and I would be curious as to his answer…but in my viewpoint at least on paper and in Speeches Newt seems to envision the actual use of private enterprise…

In other words, the same policy pursued by three Presidents over the past decade.>>

NO and that you do not know the difference speaks volumes RGO

What an insult to the brave Americans who flew that raid.

There is certainly no disrespect for great men who did their duty and then some. I am disrespecting the commanders who frivolously risked such men using kamikaze tactics that achieved nothing of strategic value.”

back to the “Oddball” quote.

The Do Very little raid (or something like it) was argued for by Ambassador Grew and others for the reasons that Rick noted…and it worked…the Japanese timetable and plans for what they were going to do “next” after taking Java etc were completely modified by the Doolittle raid…and the battle of Midway is a result.

The Army (which was running Japan) wanted a series of “fast carrier raids” along the Hawaiian frontier and the West US coast supplemented by raids on India and Australia with an emphasis on eventual landings in Aussie and taking Ceylon . The Imperial Fleet was resisting this and instead was hoping for a concentrated battle with US carriers which were starting and accomplishing fast carrier raids of their own. FDR fooled no one when he said the planes came from a mythical place…the IJN staff knew where they came from.

At this point the Army relented and started allowing the IJN to draw the US into a series of battles of which Coral Sea and Midway were the result…

Had the Do Very little raid been responsible for none of that…the raid still would have changed the notion of how the war was going.

Sadly you know nothing about military history. I would have to grade you at an F. RGO

I don’t think that there are decades left for that discussion.

Once again, I believe that the Wolfe amendment is unconstitutional, as it intrudes on the Executive’s ability to conduct foreign policy.

I hate to say it, but I think I would actually miss the entertainment value of your B.S. if you were banned. That comment was actually one of your more lucid ones. I really think you say a lot of obviously idiotic things just for shock value. No sane person could say some of the other things you have said and mean them. Of course, for all I know you could be locked in a loonie bin somewhere with internet access.