GUN CAMERA COMPILATION IN HD COLOR - PACIFIC AIR COMBAT 1944-1945 [ WWII DOCUMENTARY ]

Compilation of great quality original color guncam reels from the Pacific War 1944-1945.
If you'd like to support my channel, i have a Patreon: / lookinthepast
Also check out my main channel for informative videos about military history, vehicles and weapons: / lookinthepast
#guncam #color #combat
Footage has been:
Researched
- Digitally restored
- Upscaled to FHD
- Edited together from various archive film reels
by Look in The Past channel.
After 1942, the United States made a massive effort to build up its aviation forces in the Pacific, and began island-hopping to push its airfields closer and closer to Tokyo. Meanwhile, the Japanese were unable to upgrade their aircraft, and they fell further and further behind in numbers of aircraft carriers. The forward island bases were very hard to supply-often only submarines could get through-and the Japanese forces worked without replacements or rest, and often with inadequate food and medicine. Their morale and performance steadily declined. Starvation became an issue in many bases. The American airmen were well-fed and well-supplied, but they were not rotated and faced increasingly severe stress that caused their performance to deteriorate. They flew far more often in the Southwest Pacific than in Europe, and although rest time in Australia was scheduled, there was no fixed number of missions that would produce transfer back to the States. Coupled with the monotonous, hot, sickly environment, the result was bad morale that jaded veterans quickly passed along to newcomers. After a few months, epidemics of combat fatigue would drastically reduce the efficiency of units. The most know fighter planes of the pacific war: American side: P-40 Warhawk, F4F Wildfat, F6F Hellcat, P-51 Mustang, P-38 Lightning, F4U Corsair Japanese side: KI-100, KI-102, KI-45, A5M, A6M, J2M, Ki-43. Ki-44
I'm posting digitally enhanced/restored rare documentaries regularly. Feel free to browse around my channel and subscribe if you like the content.

[@aaaht3810]

I bet there is a lot of gun camera footage sitting in a storage facility somewhere that's never been seen by the public.

[@patrick1564]

Also at the bottom of the oceans from splashdowns

[@Hannah-nf1vg]

No there isnt unless they already digitized it, film from early nuclear tests in the 50s have degraded in storage so much that some cant be fixed without ai if its been there since 45 its trash now

[@dzhang4459]

@@Hannah-nf1vg properly stored film can last indefinitely. However gun cam footage in WWII was almost always destroyed after review. The ones we do have were copies given to press for publication. There's almost no chance of any unpublished originals existing.

[@pmp2559]

It’s in that warehouse along with the ark of the Covenant and other secrets are kept.

[@RaveApe]

I would also assume there’s a lot of unseen footage in private collections

[@Rationalific]

Some of those beaches look like absolute perfect paradises. And they are juxtaposed with the largest war ever fought...

[@BrianAchterberg928]

I talked to Pacific Theater fighter pilot one time and he told me that he would be so low pulling out of a straffing run dive that if he had his landing gear down they would be pulling pieces of palm trees out of it after he got back to his carrier. Those pilots had balls of titanium back then!!!

[@lkalashnikov47]

Balls of uranium. Most bravest pilots of all-time.

[@warrenprovost8625]

Great footage. & no anoying music or effects. 🇬🇧👍

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

Glad you like it! I hate it too when someone puts fake sounds under historical footage.

[@boshi_coyo]

Honestly i like the explosion and gunfire sounds, even if they are fake it adds a hint of realism since you can hear what is happening. You can appreciate it when someone takes the time to add realistic sounds to a muted video as long as they aren't annoying to all hell or just plain up have the wrong audio's

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

If you guys enjoyed the video you can support my work by checking out my main channel as well where i post in depth videos about historical events, vehicles and weapons: kzbin.info

[@boydmaddocks838]

All well & good to watch the footage but never forget we witness the very best, of their best, dying. Lest we forget. For all whom serve

[@ahsayamisaya7844]

If I had to pick between being a pilot in WWII or modern times, I would pick modern every day of the week. WWII was absolutely brutal. WWII: Gets shredded by high cal machine guns while burning to death in a metal coffin with no escape. Modern: Gets immediately killed by missile with the possibility of being able to eject and survive. I can't even imagine what these guys back then were thinking before and during combat. Absolutely terrifying.

[@user-qs4ti1bh6e]

Those planes were the state of the art back then. They didn't have anything else to compare it to other than WW1 biplanes with open cockpits and no parachutes or radios.

[@devonwhetenhale8828]

Extremely cool! Thank you so much for posting! 😊

[@basilbrush2209]

This footage is from the fighting lady. There is a HD quality version. Robert Taylor narrating

[@45CaliberCure]

Great footage! Thank you!

[@Shogun459]

Beautiful film thank you.

[@dejavu666wampas9]

Thanks so much for not putting the watermark right in the middle. Awesome.

[@SpartacusErectusJR]

Just remember every tracer round you see there’s 4 more in front and behind it…

[@heywoodjablowme8120]

Not so young one, many crews went 1 for 1 tracers to ammo

[@buzaldrin8086]

While the Japanese Zero was built to be light, fast and agile, it had no armor plating even in the front windshield and no liner in the fuel tank. Fatal when hit.

[@yourdad3588]

Imagine u were on a zero and got hit by a 8.50cal machine gun from a p47 💀💀

[@clearcreek69]

@@yourdad3588 The pilot would graduate from flying a zero to a cheese grater

[@MrSouthernguy08]

The dad of a friend of mine was a Hellcat pilot. He said all you needed was to hit the wings of a Zero with a couple of rounds and the gasoline would ignite. Hit the engine and it would blow almost immediately. Japanese pilots called the Hellcat "The Flying Devil."

[@anibalcesarnishizk2205]

The doctrine was Speed is the Armour.

[@buzaldrin8086]

@@anibalcesarnishizk2205 How did that work out?

[@ninjasupreme5966]

Amazing footage. These pilots were bad asses!

[@ronin6158]

7:04 daaamn

[@spingebill8551]

That was relatively tame for what I think is a supply ship carrying ammunition/explosives. Also, this is why sailors hated being in a convoy with these ships even if their ship in particular wasn’t carrying explosive cargo.

[@hughsmith7281]

Thank you.

[@coreyrowland]

Some of these guys pull off some sick moves

[@the_phaistos_disk_solution]

Very good!

[@c-57d55]

Looks like most if not all of this footage is 16mm early Kodachrome stock. (I don't think they could fit 35mm cameras in the wings, but I could be wrong). Kodachrome then had a 10 ASA light sensitivity, which looks darker and darker into late afternoon and sunset as you could only get a good exposure in bright sunlight. One 100 foot roll of film was good for only 2 1/2 minutes of run time, that's it. Your iPhone is probably 20 times more sensitive than the cameras used here. Amazing that we have all this footage to study considering the limitations they had to deal with 80 years ago!

[@RAVANA7]

Nobody cares😐

[@Ward413]

@@RAVANA7Stop taking your shame over having a micro phallus out on random people online dawg. Shit is obvious. Get a life.

[@javaman329]

Interesting info, I'd seen color gun camera footage 50 yrs ago so knew the color was genuine film color and not colorized like some of what shows up on youtube

[@tylerrichards6456]

Amazing footage. That F6F coming in from the left at 9:05 almost got SMOKED by friendly fire! Could he really not see the line of his buddy’s tracers he flew right into or was he just recklessly fixated on getting a confirmed kill out of this mission? Interesting that the danger Hellcat didn’t bother to jettison his drop tank before he got tangled up in a dogfight- must have felt that he would never be under threat himself.

[@jackhoff4635]

He was tryna steal his kill

[@jackhoff4635]

Probably knew he would stop shooting

[@topa1798]

After watching both front,western and Pacific you can tell the most brutal front is the Pacific campaign, American pilot facing BF 109 fired short burst of ammo,but the Pacific theater American pilot really squeeze the trigger,it's personal

[@user-gc1po6hb3s]

Битва в Тихом океане это детская прогулка по сравнению с битвой в Сталинграде. Советский Союз потерял убитыми в Сталинградской компании больше солдат, чем Американцы за всю Вторую мировую войну. Сталинград для Германии, это было фатальное поражение, изменившее ход войны.

[@seantalkingthroughthemedia4838]

​@user-gc1po6hb3s Nothing Child like about any of the war. Comparing killing to killing is pointless

[@dalepaladin916]

​@user-gc1po6hb3s are you adding how many Russians Stalin outright murdered, and the purge of the military to eliminate rivals, and oh yes, how many Poles he caused to be killed? F Stalin.

[@BurtSampson]

Eastern Front was legit worse than the pacific even. If you think the japs and the Americans hated each other, the animosity between the Soviets and Germany was on a whole other level. That said, I'm sure the entire war was hell on earth for everyone involved. Shit, my grandpa got shot down over Germany, I grew up hearing ALL about the air war in ww2, and coming from a man who not only fought in the skies over germany, but even had to bail out and eventually got captured, it certainly sounded like an absolute nightmare. lol. But Eastern Front, now that was a style of warfare that mankind hopefully never has to live through again.

[@nodical802]

@@seantalkingthroughthemedia4838 No, it most certainly isn’t pointless. Are you high?? It’s invaluable to categorizing the history of warfare

[@nemo_5450]

Damn, these Zeros really did explode when hit in the fuel tank...

[@user-qs4ti1bh6e]

Yep, no self sealing fuel tanks and no armor protection at all.

[@TheFool_0]

Man. Ww1 and 2 fighter pilots were a different breed.

[@christopherhanton6611]

Very neat 👌

[@jackncoke8527]

Question for the WWII aircraft enthusiasts: why does all gun cam footage make tracers look “squiggly”? I’ve fired thousands upon thousands of 5.56, 7.62, .50 and 25mm tracers on the ground and that’s not how they look. Is it an effect from the older cameras or does it have something to do with firing from an aircraft?

[@Concorde1059]

It's the vibration of the camera (from all sorts of sources, but especially the guns), combined with exposure time per frame that isn't instantaneous. You can see that especially in the worst examples of the squiggles, everything else is quite blurry too.

[@illusive1805]

Those that served in ww2 are true heroes,enough so,that we have the freedoms we cherish today!!🫡

[@donttellmeitsraining8160]

That “beaten zone” is horrifying. Considering every 5th round is tracer.

[@michaelh2899]

Wow. This is great. Love the lack of sound effects.

[@megmatrago2397]

The adrenaline that the ww2 pilots would have felt would have been impressive when they pulled the trigger against a ship or another plane. those dogfights and close range shooting will no longer be seen.

[@shootfirst2097]

Daring strafing runs at 3:14. I wish I knew what these islands were

[@pierredefecto977]

Maybe Wake?

[@spingebill8551]

@@pierredefecto977that’s what I was thinking. It looks like Wake Atoll, but I’m not certain.

[@adolin1338]

3:14 cutting it fine

[@krayzieegg7294]

now thats what you call a real action cam

[@johneverson2433]

I keep reminding myself that everyone of those flashes that shows the bullets there are 5 more that you can’t see

[@pierredefecto977]

The Emily at the beginning took a lot of punishment before going down, others blew up after just a few seconds.

[@jimmyhain]

Wish there was audio so I could hear those A6M2 engines

[@shaundavenport621]

It's surreal to know people are dying in these crashes!😢

[@growlkitty]

I was thinking the same thing; human beings are being killed and dying in these films.

[@stefanwiebers9991]

Master of the air....

[@mikehunt7419]

03:13 What a pass!!!!!

[@dekotaroberts7096]

I’ve been lucky enough to see a few of these exact float planes still in Japanese service for the JASDF

[@mEmEzMaN...]

Not the same but a slightly similar design Jsdf use US-2 aircraft The H8K "emily" was the plane in this video You can actually see one at the imperial Japanese aviation resource centre

[@davidwhitney1171]

In late 1944 Japan finally developed a fighter meant to replace the aging and obsolete Zero- the Shiden, or "Lightening" in English *I believe), which was given the codename "George" by the Allies. It was a match for the Hellcat and gave a good account of itself in the few battles in which it fought. But unfortunately for the Japanese it was the familiar story of "too little too late," and severe fuel shortages grounded most of those which were built...

[@BatMan-oe2gh]

Even if the Japs had enough pilots and fuel, they would have still lost as America would have just put more planes into the air and the sheer weight of numbers would ensure Japan's downfall.

[@raftonpounder6696]

You mean Lightning.

[@joegagnon2268]

All in Intense fighting

[@Future-jarheadjames1775]

My great grandfather was in that was so was my great uncle rip

[@sr50223]

Zeros didn't have self sealing fuel tanks like us. That's why they turned into a cherry bomb.

[@Augmental_Art]

Oh my God

[@geh3254]

Awesome, nice job.

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

I'm glad you enjoyed it! Look around for other interesting things on my channel, and for more informative videos on my other channel: kzbin.info

[@randyhoy9692]

My friend Ian Thom (rip) Ian❤, shot down a Zero in his Corsair! He told me he couĺdnt shake him till he went full flaps.

[@wellshutchins6885]

If all the footage was of the same plane, that four engine Kawanishi H8K flying boat could sure take a lot of hits.

[@shawnc1016]

And if it wasn't, they filmed a measurable percentage of them. I think Japan only built a few hundred.

[@BatMan-oe2gh]

@@shawnc1016 127 to be exact. But the majority were shot down.

[@Aninga32]

Thousands of lives lost to save the freedom of the world. Most were still young children. Innocent lives cut too short.

[@Mets2015WorldSeries]

Thousands? It was 70 million man

[@lello333]

Rest in Peace all poor MAN that GAVE THEY LIFES FOR THE STUPIDITY OF few.

[@franktreppiedi2208]

It was no small feat to bring down those Emily Japanese flying boats. They had 5 20mm cannons on them.

[@rtpfixit]

9:10 another pilot swoops in to assist (steal?) the kill with a little bit too much enthusiasm, lucky for him the pilot of the plane filming this just barely laid off the trigger in time. So much confusion in these dogfights, I bet friendly fire was pretty common, though we'll probably never going to see that footage (which is probably for the best).

[@deeppurple883]

The people who put this up should have added sound. I don't know why they didn't, it would have been a better video. We have the tech why not use it. ✊

[@livedontleave]

thats a great fear that there's no inject

[@generalpanzerfaust2387]

This is a hidden gem. Do you have gun cam footage of German pilots?

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

Glad you like it. Share it so it gets more views :) Have some german footage, but they are in general not very good quality. They will be uploaded soon.

[@topa1798]

German and Japanese Aces too please 🙏🙏🙏

[@lordofbathurst]

10:35 what happened here why did it roll continuously did the controls seize?

[@mrsiborg]

I'm guessing a control cable or rod got hit allowing the aileron to fully deflect in on direction.

[@mesothelioma5024]

I would assume most of these are Hellcats with maybe a couple SBDs and an SB2C

[@tomasinacovell4293]

Give to those Pons!

[@catanimator9782]

They really do put gopros on their plane back then

[@janainaeleuterio]

Já vimos como é na Paraíba? 3:38

[@mysticwine]

Looks like there's incoming tracers on some of these runs....

[@michaelratliff9449]

Great films!..add some sound and make it perfect!

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

Sorry man on this channel we don't add fake sounds on the historical videos

[@tekkhero9767]

Was this originally shot in color? Or has color been added?

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

This is original color footage

[@tekkhero9767]

@@LookinThePastWarArchives wow thats really cool!!

[@DemonSliime]

That first Kawasaki had zero chance of surviving. It was getting swarmed by like 12 fighters.

[@Josh-cw1qg]

why does this island look like diego garcia

[@Chungdn8888]

It must be very expensive to install a video camera on the fighter plane😮😢

[@slavavsg8309]

а звук где

[@at1970]

Sea plane had to just take it.

[@lordofbathurst]

Why did this get deleted and reuploaded

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

Just channel restructuring.

[@Shogun459]

Watching all those tracers slowing down, knowing there's 3-5 regular bullets between each of them. It's easy to see how a pilot could "shoot himself down" just by diving into those rounds. That's what you get for firing too early.

[@ProdriveGT]

How horrible, none of this will be remembered in the new earth........

[@guidelinesR4pooCz]

Well I mean, we have the videos so......

[@janainaeleuterio]

12:11 🎉😂❤

[@rogerballs2014]

did anyone get harmed in the making of this film... ?

[@tristanholland6445]

The larger red balls that you see especially in the mid section with the merchant ships those are Japanese 25mm AA rounds.

[@David-hk3ly]

The most useless AA gun of the war. Copied from the French Hotchkiss gun, non radar controlled, hand cranked and optically sighted, it had to be hand fed with limited ammo cartridges. It was slow, obsolete and dangerous to the crew.

[@David-hk3ly]

Looking at these shots there was no way Japan was going to win the war!

[@shaundavenport621]

They went for quantity over quality. Big mistake!!

[@jackhoff4635]

Wtf did he hit on that boat at 7:04 ??

[@jackhoff4635]

This ai is remarkable yiu can even see the shock wave. As a someone who who grew up watching ww2 movies with my dad and brother and always had a fascination with it this brings a tear to my eye

[@-dash]

Munitions of some kind probably, not sure

[@user-qs4ti1bh6e]

Probably mines, depth charges, something like that. Definitely some kind of high explosive, not fuel.

[@firefox5926]

10:59 the hardest thing about watching this is know that their are people inside those planes... and how utterly pointless and unnecessary it all was

[@shaundavenport621]

Sometimes unfortunately peace can only be achieved through war!

[@firefox5926]

@@shaundavenport621 mmm not really it just requires alot more work .. if you want peace then you must prepare for it and that means getting everyone everywhere to be readdy to cull anyone who trys top start something before they get to power not after war is a result of failure

[@clee6746]

Let the bad guys have a good dose of taste of destruction.

[@davehuckleberry9869]

NO SOUND!!!!

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

Well this is a WWII video, and they did not record sounds on gun cameras. And on this channel we don't mix fake sounds under the historical footage

[@stewartross1233]

You mean no annoying fake sound!

[@DeltaEchoGolf]

All you would probably hear is the muffled sounds of the machine-guns and engines because of all the air passing by the aircraft.

[@janainaeleuterio]

12:22 Oi 800 &* 12:22 🎉😂❤

[@devoid24]

firing like that on an un-armed plane (first video), pretty cowardly really.... shoot the engine, let is land on the sea (which its designed for)....

[@johnedwards1685]

I reckon that flying boat is a Kawanishini H8K2. It was armed with five 20mm cannon and five machine guns. The pilot is staying low on the water to keep attackers from getting into its undefended underside. The cannon outrange the fighter’s guns. That aircraft was a dangerous target.

[@user-qs4ti1bh6e]

That Emily has very high STRATEGIC value, not just tactical value like a fighter/bomber. The Emily was an extremely long range reconnaissance/communications/logistics support aircraft. Something important was in the works if you came across an Emily so it has to go down...right now. A defense won't pass on the opportunity to sack the quarterback before they can get a play started and this is the combat equivalent of the quarterback sack.

[@VictorTimofti]

Where can I see the original non-AI footage?

[@BatMan-oe2gh]

That is not AI footage. It is actual footage.

[@-dash]

@@BatMan-oe2ghIt certainly wasn’t shot in color. I think he means the source footage before any major digital processing

[@BatMan-oe2gh]

@@-dash You do know that they had colour way back in 1908. Americans were using colour film from 1943 and used colour in the Pacific for better quality.

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

@@-dash This was shot in color, it's not colorized.

[@-dash]

@@LookinThePastWarArchives i stand corrected! you should look up Flowframes if you have a high bitrate copy of the source footage. This would look great in 60+ FPS

[@LeftIsBest001]

Why keep shooting at a plane that's on fire and is going to crash?

[@o9rgeronimo979]

Anger, plus a dead pilot flys no more.

[@larryschmid3834]

So glad they saved this treasure. If you teens watch this and think about World War Two and what it took to keep our land. If germany had kept on workkng on an atomic bomb instead of the rockets, we might probably be speaking German today.

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

Glad you liked it. It's important to know our history. Check my main channel too where i have more in depth informative videos: kzbin.info

[@vibrolax]

Think about this: Even if Germany had an atomic bomb, they had no bomber with enough payload capacity to deliver it. 1st gen A-bombs weighed almost 5000 kg. Maybe they could have snuck a u-boat into NYC harbor.

[@reverseuniverse2559]

Another PS6 edit

[@teds5396]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/i6i3fZ54g8t_p8ksi=c5hvmTV7Uvs6qb6v These pilots had balls of steel, what a shame that the left in this country is crapping on the graves of these REAL heroes

[@jharris0341]

USA! USA! USA!

[@shohei1523]

この動画の中の二式大艇や銀河､零戦他の胴体や翼の日の丸が目に痛い😭💔 精神主義が合理主義に敗退した時をを痛感させられる。中の搭乗員の無念さが伝わるものです‼️ 両親、家族の、日本人を守るために散華された方々に感謝合掌します🙇‍♂️⤵️ありがとうございます‼️

[@user-tikyuboueigun]

すぐ燃えて落ちていく零戦…こんなクソボロ戦闘機誰が作ったんですか…

[@GitsSAC9]

ドクトリンも知らないアホがここにいる・・・当時の戦闘機は防弾なんて無いのがほとんどだったし、機動力に全振りして回避する戦術なんだから防御力とのトレードオフは仕方ないだろ 後期型は一応防弾版も追加してるし、紫電なんかも最初から装備してる ニワカのくせに恥ずかしいからそのアイコン外せよな

[@-dash]

😅

[@buckwheat9932]

Waist of ammo when hes on fire going down, save some for the next.

[@ChenBeixuancultivatingnshieeet]

okay john wick you do the double tap and end up screaming like zoomer coomer when they finish you off

[@DeltaEchoGolf]

I assume they want to make sure they go down. You don't want them coming back and possibly shooting you down. Especially when you have only two options. Landing in the middle of the ocean or getting captured by the Japanese and getting tortured or even eaten!

[@panelvanman7671]

the cameras are only activated while firing so to confirm a kill they followed it shooting at the time of disintegration or impact for proof of kill

[@SEPK09]

And no sound what so ever!!!!

[@LookinThePastWarArchives]

There was no sound recorded with these reels and i don't put fake gun sounds under the videos.

[@metingursel1026]

Compare and contrast with German Luftwaffe fighter pilots, US pilots seems incompetent- great majority of their attacks miss the target

[@Mets2015WorldSeries]

More bullets being fired means more miss

[@-dash]

Luftwaffe had an intimidating posture but I’m not sure if they were actually more any more skilled than USAF or RAF pilots. Seems like their reputation said more about German engineers than anything else

[@AB-mw8oz]

The myth of the Luftwaffe. Reality is of the top 10 aces in the Luftwaffe, around 95% of their combined kills happened on the Russian front and those who did have a significant amount of kills on the western Front, they achieved most of those kills in France and the Low Countries in 1939 and 1940. When it came to Western pilots things were very evenly matched

[@mickz4601]

Wow talk about an adrenaline rush!

[@leeoswald9799]

It looks like it took them an hour to shoot down an unarmed old plane.

[@user-qs4ti1bh6e]

The Emily wasn't unarmed but it certainly wasn't heavily armed either. It was primarily a long range reconnaissance/intelligence gathering/communications/logistics support aircraft. They could definitely take a beating though. An aircraft like that was more important to their war effort than a fighter. That Emily has high STRATEGIC value, not just tactical.

[@AB-mw8oz]

H8K Emily had 5 20mm type 99 Mark 1 machine guns (Official designation, don't @ me about being cannon calibre) and 5 7.7mm Type 97 Machine Guns. By no definition unarmed

[@lorenzodeimoz6028]

Put volume.