Japanese Jets
September 7 1945
USS Yorktown operating off the coast of Kyushu
Ensign John Richard had a new nickname in his squadron since his ace making flight. The pilots and ground crew now call him Dutch, which he liked better than his old nickname of the baby. As he got into his Hellcat he knew today so be easy. Over the past five days the skies over Kyushu had been cleared of Jap aircraft. But the brass wasn’t taking any chances; they were going back to Kyushu to hit the airfields again. Unknown to the Allies the Japanese had moved their first jet fighter squadron to Kyushu in the middle of the night to try and stop the Allies air attacks, and buy time for Japan.
Lieutenant George Bush had just finish his attack on the airfield as he pulled into level flight he scanned the skies. His time had given him something of a sixth sense, and he knew something was very wrong. The Japanese hadn’t sent up any fighters to try and stop the raid. As he scanned the skies something caught his eye at the 4 o’clock low. He could see it was moving too fast to be an Allied fighter. As it got closer he could see the red meatball on the side and the plane had no props. He screamed on the radio, “The fucking Japs have Jets!” He threw this Avenger into a hard left to miss the fire that was coming out of the nose of the Kikka.
Ensign John Richard was one of the few fighters that saw the jet that cause the Avenger pilot to scream. He had the high, so he pushed the nose of his Hellcat over so he could build up airspeed. As he was in the dive he pushed his throttle to the wall, and hoped he could pull out of the dive before he lost control of his plane. He soon found he had the Jap Jet in his gun sights and opened up with his six 50s. It was only a one second burst, before he pulled the hellcat out of the dive. He entered level fight only a few hundred feet off the deck. He looked up to see he had hit the jet but he hadn’t destroyed it. He started to climb back to altitude to finish off the jet. He was help by the fact that the jet had slow down to keep control of his jet. He soon found himself with an angle on the jet and opened fire again. This two second burst finish the jet. His victory was short lived, because as he scanned the skies he found that a second jet now had an angle on him. He broke hard to the right to cause the Jap to miss. He knew he couldn’t fight this one. He had the high, then he had damage the last one, and that was the only reason he had been able to shoot it down. Now the tables were turned. He stayed as close as the deck as he could to help keep the Jet from getting an angle on him. He could see the tracers past in front of him, he knew he would have to do something, then he notice his throttle was still out the firewall. He pulled the throttle as low as he dare. The jet then overshot him a few second later. After the jet overshot he pushed his throttle back to the firewall and quickly got his sights on the jet. Once in his sights he opened up with his six 50s for a long five second burst. He shot down his second jet of the day and decided it was enough and started his back to the coast.