How we took out Yamamoto...

In WW2, IJN Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto was the architect & chief planner of the Pearl Harbor attack, & of the 1st 6 months of Japanese success everywhere they turned. His plans were carried out so smoothly & with such few consequences that even he wrote of "Victory Disease", that is, growing complacent because victories had come so easily.

Y had been educated at Harvard & had toured the US. He knew of our potential for industrial might that could far-outpace Japan's, not to mention abundant food & over twice the population. He knew he had to act swiftly to help Japan attain her aims, and act swiftly he did!

He was horrified that, because of the time differences in Pearl Harbor & Washington DC that weren't taken into account, the PH attack occurred before war had been officially declared, a fact that FDR took full advantage of in calling for a declaration of war by the US, and revenge. Y was familiar enough with Yankees to know that a "sneak attack" would arouse the whole nation to fury so they'd fight much-harder against Japan. This drove Y to act as swiftly as he & the IJN could.

Y had predicted to the other top military brass that he could "run wild" for 6 months, scoring victory after victory, but after that, he didn't know. And on Apr. 18, 1942, he & the entire military suffered great loss of face over the Doolittle raid on Tokyo.

Stung to fury, Y shoved forward his plans to take Guadalcanal, Tulagi Island, & Port Moresby on New Guinea. However, his forces suffered their first setback in the Battle of the Coral Sea where his Moresby invasion was forced to return to base because it'd had lost its air cover. This caused Y to become almost-obsessed with forcing the US fleet into a showdown battle in which Y expected the IJN to annihilate it. But Adm. Nimitz, commander of the US Pacific Fleet, was too shrewd for that, knowing his force was then no match for the IJN.

Y figured that an attack to take Midway would force Nimitz to come out & fight, but he rushed his plan forward, but with shoddy strategy. He GUESSED that Nimitz would react as he believed, but that was the last thing Nimitz intended to do.Besides, unknown to Y, Commander Rochefort & his team of cryptanalysts had chacked the Japanese naval cypher, so Nimitz couldn't've been better-informed had he sat at Y's side. This led to the crushing defeat at Midway.

But the IJN was still very strong, and Y intended to consolidate Japan's earlier victories & strengthen the Empire's bastions, but he still had the idea of wanting to force the US fleet into a decisive battle.

After the Japanese defeat at Guadalcanal, Y decided to make an inspection tour to boost morale in April, 1943. But details of his journey were intercepted by US codebreakers, so virtually all the details of his trip were known. Nimitz saw one chance to attack him - as he headed for a small island near Bougainville Island. Nimitz asked permission from Washington to make the attempt, and clearance was given.

A squadron of P-38 Lightnings, the only US fighter planes with sufficient range to go that far, and, knowing Y's penchant for promptness, arrived near his destination almost right on time. Sixteen P-38s attacked 6 escorting Zeros & 2 "Betty" bombers that carried Y in one & his Chief-of-Staff, Adm. Ugaki, in the other. Both were shot down, with Y's plane crashing into the Bougainville jungle & Ugaki's falling into the sea. (Ugaki survived.)

Next day, the Japanese found Y's plane & Y's body. He'd been ejected from the plane, but his body was unmarked except for two .50 cal. bullet wounds, a minor one in the L shoulder, the other through his L jaw, emerging over his R eye. Had that bullet not hit him, he would've almost certainly survived!

Japan had no other admiral with nearly Y's ability. His death likely shortened the war by at least a year, & likely saved many Allied lives.