Operation Meetinghouse was launched and underway,
Each Super-fortress stripped of all but tail guns for the day.
We came in fast; we came in low, let darkness shield our flight.
Within our bays the bomblets lay to set the Nips alight.
I heard them at a distance, a large incoming flight,
Inexorable and frightening; like Death approaching Life.
I awakened my old mother, took my small child by the hand.
I fled down towards the river, as the first bombs shook the land.
The night was clear and windy and our bombers cut a swathe
of death, fire and destruction through their capital that night.
Their homes of wood and paper were quickly set alight.
We could smell the people burning. We flew so low that night.
Shitamachi was on fire and the high winds helped them spread.
The fire crews were overwhelmed and quickly joined the dead.
The thick smoke made it hard to breathe, old mother couldn’t stand.
The horrors that we saw that night were like tales of the dammed.
Our fuselage of silver reflects their dying light.
Our losses are acceptable; few planes are lost this night.
Flying in formation, we bank right and turn to go
The skyline of the city flickers with a hellish glow.
I walk the ruined streets of home in dawn’s uncertain light.
I hold my small child by the hand, old mother died last night.
We have no home, nowhere to go, I stare in helpless shock
At charred cars and blackened corpses on what used to be our block.
The General is ecstatic and enjoying his cigar;
our losses few, their suffering great, the fortunes of the war.
Tokyo lies in ruins from the fires set that night
How fortunate God is on our side and we are always right.
Operation Meetinghouse was a raid on Tokyo that took place on the night of 03/09/1945.
16 square miles of Tokyo burned and the dead and wounded were numbered at 125,000.( that number may be conservative). In any event, the death toll and destruction was greater than either of the Atom bombings. Like Dresden, in Germany, Tokyo was a City destroyed by Allied air power. Shitamachi was a suburb of Tokyo that was especially hard hit as it housed small factories related to aircraft production
No war crime charges are ever brought against the victors.