Curtis LeMay, The American Air Force General That Implemented Strategic Bombing

[@Dronescapes]

Click the link to watch more aircraft, heroes, and their stories, and missions: www.youtube.com/@Dronescapes

[@russvoight1167]

My uncle, a KC-135, KB-50, and KC-97 boom operator briefly met General LeMay at Wright-Patterson. I asked him his opinion of General LeMay and he told me the only ones who didn't like General LeMay were those not doing their job. LeMay's greatest success was his ability to pick people right for the job. He had high expectations but also let people do their job. He was not a micromanager

[@dehavillandcanadatwinotter9621]

Nah, the ones who dislike LeMay are rational people who don't like to bomb innocents.

[@samlemay2293]

Erm general lemay is my great cousin

[@PC.505]

@@samlemay2293 to this day Chinese people honour General LeMay sincerely.

[@GM8101PHX]

While he was retired before I entered the Air Force, my second assignment was at Fairchild AFB (SAC), we were drilled constantly, the klaxon ordering our nuclear armed bombers to the runway. We never had problems and us Security Police helped make that happen. In our training we were well versed on General Curtis E. LeMay. Failure was not an option and the entire base knew it. We with all the branches won the cold war in September 1991 without firing a nuclear shot in anger. He might have been tough as nails, but the job got done, and we had the best chow and were rewarded for our work!!

[@trainnerd3029]

Curtis LeMay….. American Badass!!! FACT!!!

[@PC.505]

Curtis LeMay Barbecue, very famous for history

[@creepythecritter]

Too bad he was a homosexual

[@thomasharroun8068]

LeMay had an analytical mind that saw solving a problem as more important than how you solved it -- even if the method was morally ambiguous. LeMay once bombed the US Navy ship USS Utah during an military exercise to prove a point.

[@USAACbrat]

Curt ran for President in '64, short campaign but for a while he was running mate with Gen. Barry Goldwater. Can you imagine the Alternate History.

[@raymondmiller5098]

Cong. William Miller was Goldwater's 1964 running mate. ( LeMay was the VP candidate on the American Independent Party ticket with Wallace in 1968, serving as a "spoiler" that resulted in Nixon barely winning over Humphrey.)

[@USAACbrat]

@@raymondmiller5098 Lemay ran in 64 for a short while until the power hat be decided a 2 general ticket wouldn't work and he was dropped

[@haroldmclean3755]

He had the Right Stuff and He also knew how to use it most effectively 👍 Super High Kudos

[@daubendiek]

SAC would have never been what it was without General LeMay. I had the honor and privilege to have served in SAC (after his time) and they still talked about him and his vision for SAC

[@billotto602]

I'm a dyed in the wool Navy man, but ive always admired Gen LeMay. A truer patriot you will never find. I would loved to have met him & shook his hand. After saluting him of course ! RIP & God bless you sir. 🫡 🇺🇸

[@mgway4661]

He cooked babies by the thousands

[@squeaky206]

​@@mgway4661And the Japanese impaled them by the thousands.

[@keithplymale2374]

My father was USAF AP 1957-63. Told me once he was in the honor guard when General LeMay, smoking a cigar, visited the SAC base he was stationed at.

[@ColKorn1965]

Was there ever a time he was NOT smoking a cigar?🤔

[@mbazzy123]

I grew up on 2 SAC bases in the 70's his legasy commanded a standard of excellence from all personal sometimes including us dependants !

[@ColKorn1965]

He was my dad's boss in SAC from 1951-55

[@samlemay2293]

Curtis is actually my great cousin

[@asullivan4047]

Interesting and informative. Excellent photography job enabling viewers to better understand what/whom the orator was describing. Professional class A research project!!!

[@Dronescapes]

Many thanks!

[@janineboitard6492]

Guaranteed... Houthis wouldn't be around if LeMay was alive. He defended U.S. military personnel with resolve!

[@Electriceye1984bySam]

Excellent! Thank you🫡

[@Dronescapes]

Our pleasure!

[@williamweir2744]

A true American

[@chrismasotti8028]

Who conspired to kill his commander and chief

[@pelucrespins8562]

The American Fuhrer could have been...

[@CantaloupeJones]

Nice channel great documentary

[@Dronescapes]

Much appreciated

[@russvoight1167]

General LeMay assumed command of SAC in 1948 as a Lieutenant General. He did not get promoted to 4 star until 1951

[@JinKee]

The bomber always gets through.

[@joshowen9054]

strategic bombing aka torchin'g civilians with napalm. ironically, he later received from Japan's govt First‐Class Order of Merit of the Grand Cordon of the Rising Sun, for helping to establish Japan’s modern air force after the war.

[@iluisdejesus28]

I still don't understand how in some countries they call people like this guy a "national hero."

[@samlemay2293]

He got revenge on Japan from bombing America in the first place

[@TomFynn]

Look at the casualties Japan caused. Then you'll understand.

[@kenkruger481]

Second half of this video: It appears that there was a lot of preflight micro-managing by the aircrew especially the pilots prior to a mission. I'm not a novice to military aviation but a retired USN CDR with over 7000 hours in the Navy and 16,000 more with the airlines retiring from one of the 3 major airlines. Was it lack of training of maintenance personnel that required such close and detailed inspections necessitating the aircraft commanders to have tape measures and air pressure gauges? Or was it the general mentality of the military during WWII? To me, effective leaders foster trustworthiness, competence, and accountability. Second guessing the many professionals that make your aircraft and mission ready is counterproductive unless the the errors are readily apparent. (But accountability will be the ultimate stopgap for such incompetence.) Nuff said.

[@bogusmogus9551]

Yeah getting the Captain of the ship to check all these points would take all godamn week. The ground crew should be doing that, A cursory check by the Captain would be enough. Can you imagine Commercial pilots having to do this? delays would be days, not hours.

[@keithplymale2374]

Thank for your service and sacrifice Cdr Kruger.

[@andreperrault5393]

USAF regulations (instructions now) vs USN NATOPS. I’m not a pilot or aviator, but have personally seen the differences.

[@SkyhawkSteve]

speaking as a former USMC avionics tech.. the tape measure surprised the heck out of me! Was this just a propaganda film designed to impress people with the level of detail of the preflight?? I did enjoy the use of the term "cannon plug" for the electrical connector, which matches my experience in the 70's. These were standard mil-spec connectors, often produced by ITT-Cannon, and costing quite a bit (I later became an avionics designer). So nice to hear the old familiar phrase "cannon plug" again, for some odd reason. 🙂

[@carolecarr5210]

How could he have not received his 5th Star.

[@ポォロロ]

This person...Tokyo...

[@rjhtrucking5429]

America's Arthur Harris!

[@craigelectric5241]

NEATO ! 🐰🤳

[@deanbritt9131]

Killed jfk didn’t he

[@chrismasotti8028]

Pre May 1st 1960 a great American/allied military man…post said date, an idiot, who conspired to kill JFK.

[@robert11751]

he may had a idea who did

[@vhjmvn]

A truly sickening piece of work on one of the high-climbing full-blown psychopaths that keep this world unsafe for us normal people. A hateful, as it is so very very incomplete, "documentary, " lying by omission.

[@xandervk2371]

Those "normal people" of yours are the basic source of evil in this world.

[@LuvThatDirtyWater]

I accept this documentary for what it is - a shameless piece of propaganda and nothing it says about Lemay is untrue but it only tells half of the story. So there's that and I accept Lemay for who he was during WW2 but I think there are lessons to be learned. Some say he was barbaric when he fire bombed Tokyo with napalm and we thought we knew how barbaric the Japanese were after they slaughtered 250,000 civilians in Nanking but we didn't have a clue until they beheaded American POWs on Wake Island. That's when we knew! Japan wasn't playing by Marquis of Queensberry and they were real tough barbarians against defenseless civilians but we also knew they hadn't been tested and our Marine Corp was chomping at the bit to test them. Then they'd find out but then came Guadalcanal and we found out. We found out they were sneaky when they sent us a shill POW and we found out they lied when the shill said every jap on the island was starving and ready to surrender. That's when Goettge decided to go hunting with 24 gung-ho marines and they all survived the landing but none were really battle tested. In fact, this was their 1st real test and they found out the Japs don't surrender. An hour later they were all dead or wounded and only one survived to tell the tale. The rescue party only found 6 mutilated bodies and none had arms but some had their severed dicks stuffed in their mouths. That's when we found out how barbaric Fuji could be and that's when the gloves came off but the Pacific War was so savage there were no rules and after Guadalcanal there were no POWs on either side but still there are lessons yet to be learned Lemay was such a barbarian our Secretary of Defense, McNamara, said he would've been charged as a war criminal if we lost the war but being a war-time barbarian isn't what made Lemay so dangerous. During the Cuban Missile Crisis he was pounding the table demanding JFK launch a pre-emptive nuclear strike on both Cuba and Russia but wait! The basis for his insanity was revealed when he said we had "nuclear superiority" over Russia but this was AFTER Russia had put Sputnik into orbit, which meant they had "missile superiority" and Lemay forgot to mention how Russia had detonated a 50 MEGATON device a year before the Cuban Crisis even happened. So THAT is what made Lemay so dangerous and there are lessons yet to be learned from barbarians like Lemay but I fear we will never learn

[@HayastAnFedayi]

⁠@@LuvThatDirtyWaterit can be said it took someone like Lemay to defeat a regime as evil and fanatical as Imperial Japan, as awful as the firebombings were, they were necessary, just ask the Chinese, Koreans, and POW’s of the Japanese how evil they were. It was total war, a war that Japan started, and I have no doubt that if the Japanese had the technical now how and resources they would have unleashed the same type of attacks on America and others. I just don’t bye the whole Lemay was evil crap, he didn’t do these attacks to conquer other lands and what not, he did it to punish and defeat an empire that attacked America…an empire that wasn’t going to surrender…an empire that got off easy if you ask me, with how america invested and paid to rebuild Japan into the powerhouse it is today, not to mention keeping the Soviets out and preventing Japan from becoming another Vietnam or Korea.

[@bonniemanning2255]

I’m only beginning to understand what all he did & helped the secret government’s growth - today we are finding out out Constitutional government is in such danger

[@timkincade9763]

What wing did you serve with, what was your MOS ? 52X 91st missile wing USAF