April 18 marks the 50th anniversary of the death of Japan's supreme strategist of World War II. The date 50 years ago was also the start of a debate that continues to this day - who shot down Adm. Isoroku Yamamoto?
Calvin P. Rudd, an East Mill Creek resident, flew combat missions during the war as a pilot in the same fighter group as the Army Air Corps fliers who ambushed Yamamoto. He says the controversy crackles whenever the veterans hold their annual get-together."Every year we hold a reunion somewhere," said Rudd, who retired from a career in the LDS Church Education System. "And the ranks get a little thinner."
Rudd enlisted from Salt Lake City in 1942 and was in training in April 1943 when Yamamoto was shot down.
Often in his "Mormon Mauler" P-38, Rudd flew some of the longest fighter missions of the war. Sometimes he served as ground support; for example, during the American landing at Borneo, he helped destroy the great oil fields used by the Japanese.
He protected troops who invaded the Philippines and shot up oil fields and installations from New Guinea to the Dutch East Indies and Japanese rail yards in Saigon.
During one mission, his fighter took bullets in the windshield, but he was uninjured.
"I was never shot down," he said. "I was shot up, but never shot down. There's a big difference."
Right now, what Rudd is most interested in talking about is the dispute over Yamamoto's death.
Yamamoto was commander-in-chief of the Japanese navy and the architect of the Pearl Harbor attack. His death was a stunning blow to Japan's military machine.
It was also a triumph for American intelligence. Cryptographers had secretly cracked Japan's "Purple Code," and when a coded message was intercepted that Yamamoto would fly to Bougainville in the Solomon Islands, his position was pinpointed.
Yamamoto's "Betty" bomber, another bomber and half a dozen "Zero" fighter plane escorts arrived over Bougainville at 9:35 a.m., April 18, 1943. It was the exact time and place where the message said Yamamoto would be. A squadron of American P-38s was waiting.
What happened next started a controversy so hot that some veteran pilots are raising money now for a lawsuit. They want to take their case to federal court, trying to ensure that the man they believe really shot down Yamamoto gets the credit.
The man who shows up in most history books as the pilot who shot down Yamamoto is the late Thomas Lanphier, then a lieutenant in the 339th Squadron, 18th Fighter Group. Rudd was in the 44th Squadron of the same fighter group.
Each group had three squadrons, and Rudd came to know men from the other squadrons. At reunions, he not only met Lanphier but also the veteran who many believe really shot down Yamamoto, Rex T. Barber.
Barber lives in Terrebonne, Ore., near the city of Bend.
Of the 18 P-38s that took off from Guadalcanal to intercept the admiral, four of the one-man planes were designated as the "killer flight." The others were supposed to protect the four.
"These guys went out and flew 436 miles on the deck - wave-top level - navigated up there and arrived on the instant," Rudd said. "Now, that's a tremendous feat."
Keeping below about 50 feet altitude, they made sure they weren't detected by Japanese radar, he said.
After a battle in which both enemy bombers and two of the Zero fighters were shot down - as well as one American P-38 - the raiders returned to base. In Tokyo, Yamamoto had a state funeral.
Meanwhile, he said, Lanphier, the leader of the killer flight, claimed victory.
"That guy was instantly famous. He came back from the raid shouting, `I did it, I did it,' " Rudd said.
"Now, Barber is a quiet, modest man. Lanphier was not." Besides, Lanphier was the flight leader. "Who are you going to believe?" he asked.
Eventually, he became a special assistant to the secretary of the Air Force. He wrote many magazine articles about the attack. "The guy just made his living on the deal," he said.
But while that was going on, others were quietly advancing Barber's case. Some of those on the raid claimed the shooting was by Barber; another attributed it to Lanphier.
One of the veterans, George Chandler, began to champion Barber. In fact, Chandler, a bank president in Pratt, Kan., formed a group called the Second Yamamoto Mission, which champions Barber's cause.
According to Lanphier's account, he first shot down a Zero fighter. Then he wheeled around at the Betty carrying Yamamoto. He claimed he blew the Yamamoto plane's right wing off, and it crashed in the jungle, Rudd said.
"He published that over and over again," he said.
Barber's account was that he shot down Yamamoto's bomber, attacking it from the rear. The plane was burning, but the wings was still attached when the bomber hit the jungle.
"The gang, for the most part, believes Barber's story," he said.
There is one piece of physical evidence: the bomber itself. The wreckage remains in the jungle of Bougainville.
"It's a shrine. Japanese tourists go there by the bucketful," he said.
Photos taken of the aircraft show that "the left wing separated when it hit the trees. But the right wing is still on; that's the wing that Lanphier said came off."
Chandler has hounded the Air Force to credit Barber. "Chandler says, `We can prove this once and for all. Let's go to Bougainville,"' Rudd said.
But a civil war there has blocked the trip. Meanwhile, the group collected photos of the plane.
Around 1978, the Air Force came out with a determination to give Barber half of the credit for the shootdown, and Lanphier the other half. Chandler kept pressing the claim for Barber.
Earlier this year, the then-secretary of the Air Force came out with the final ruling, saying he would not reverse the 1978 findings. Rudd thinks that is partly because Lanphier is no longer alive.
Half credit isn't good enough for the Second Yamamoto Mission. Chandler and others are trying to raise money for a civil suit, throwing the case into federal court.
"They're trying to keep it alive . . . Here we are, sitting on the 50th anniversary, and the fight is still going on."