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They Called His Plan 'Insane' — Until His Propeller Downed a Japanese Plane at 38,000 Feet

WW2 Dispatch

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His six .50-caliber machine guns were loaded. Twenty-four hundred rounds. At thirty-eight thousand feet, every single one was useless.

May 10, 1945. Okinawa. A Japanese Ki-45 Nick is running a photo reconnaissance pass over the American fleet — mapping exact positions for the next kamikaze wave. Four Marine Corsairs scramble to intercept. Two turn back with engine failures. Captain Reusser empties his guns into the Nick, damages it, runs dry. First Lieutenant Robert Klingman closes in, squeezes the trigger — nothing. The gun oil has frozen solid at minus fifty-seven degrees.

Klingman looks at his propeller. Three aluminum blades spinning at two thousand RPM. He makes a decision that should have killed him.

Three passes. One dead stick landing. One destroyed propeller. And a Japanese reconnaissance plane in pieces on the ocean floor.

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Sources:
Robert Klingman, Navy Cross citation, Hall of Valor: https://valor.militarytimes.com/hero/...
Story of Bob: drummer, pilot, legend, U.S. Marine Corps: https://www.marines.mil/News/News-Dis...
Robert Sherrod, History of Marine Corps Aviation in World War II (1952): https://archive.org/details/historyof...
Okinawa: Victory in the Pacific, USMC monograph (1955): https://archive.org/details/OkinawaVi...
Archival photos and footage are public domain (U.S. National Archives, Library of Congress) or used under Creative Commons licenses.

#worldwar2 #ww2 #militaryhistory #ww2stories #ww2dispatch

20 Comments

@theoldman8877 4 months ago

You know it is painful to listen to aviation stories written by non aviators. Especially when they try to get specific. He never mentioned doing a forward slip to lose alitude and speed at lower altitudes.

@johnjennings5180 5 days ago

Amazing AMERICAN heroism. The younger generations should learn to appreciate this. FREEDOM ISN'T FREE !!

@sometimesleela 2 weeks ago

Amazing how he had time to log engine temp and oil pressure every five minutes

@JohnHuggins-b8q 5 days ago

I’m in Germantown tn spent 5 years in the Air Force as a communications officer aboard the SAC headquarters flying command post (call sign Looking Glass - 1965 to ‘69 as a captain on the HQ battle staff) but my real connection to the service was the fact that my older brother served in Korea as a lieutenant on the army artillery corps and was KIA as a forward observer. He was buried in Memphis with full military honors!
Jh

@JohnReall 4 months ago

I have a Hamilton Standard Blade newspaper from July 9, 1945 with a picture of Robert Klingman standing in front of his Corsair on the cover. You can see the damage to the propeler.

@DennisGBlair 3 months ago

An old USAF Vietnam Vet retired in England. I love reading aviation stories. Two cousins flew in WWII, one was a B-17 co-pilot and his younger brother was a B-24 gunner. Buryl Jackson made it home. Eulyse Jackson was blown up over Holland but buried in Memphis, TN..

@TacticalRick507 5 days ago

Question how did the maintenance Crews strip the radios from the damaged corsairs when you specifically said that they removed the radios to save weight?

@PeterStratton-i4u 4 months ago

The.numbers on that final approach were made up by someone who has NEVER landed ANY airplane: complete BULLSHIT!

@timking2822 2 months ago (edited)

Service ceiling is defined as where an aircraft can no longer climb faster than 100 feet per minute. In other words, it's not the maximum altitude an aircraft can reach. Note this is well above the enemy aircraft at 38,000ft. Also, black smoke in the exhaust indicates an overly rich mixture. The armor removed was behind the pilot. The engine in front was his 'armor' and that, obviously was still there. This is so melodratic and inaccurate.

@alangardner4359 1 month ago

Thank you for telling these stories and keeping their service alive.

@Harleylovinchelley1 3 months ago

Too much detail, too wordy. It began to feel like we would never get to the point.

Try again, cut about 25 minutes off it.

@JeffreyDripps 2 months ago

My late Father, Private 1st class Cecil Dripps served in General George Patton's 82nd army as a truck driver hauling fuel to keep the tanks moving. Had to exit his truck at 45 mph when a German Messerschmitt strafed he and his passenger. My father was unscathed but his passenger not so lucky and tore up his knee. My Father enlisted when he was 17, his Mother wrote him a note saying he was 18. He went through the Battle of the Bulge, Landed on Omaha Beach on D-Day+3 and spent 3 years traversing Europe. He spoke of spending time in Antwerp Belgium, France, Poland and many other towns as he followed the 82nds tanks. He saw first hand and brought back photos of bodies stacked at Auschwitz. He visited both Dachau and Birkenau. My Mother said he had horrible dreams for over 20 years after his return. At the same time my Uncle Ike Clarke was in Okinawa battling the Japanese. Upon his return he fell into the bottle and shortly later committed suicide. The Pacific War killed a lot of men, even after they returned from battle.

@AnsleyClements 4 months ago

watching from gonzales, louisiana. My uncle, Raymond Zaorski, fleww in a B-s7 bomber over Germany in 1942, surviving twenty-five missions in his aircraft "eight ball," which was an incredible feat that early in the air war over Europe. I have a photo of him standing nexr to his bomber with his crewmates and the actor, Clark Gable.

@wvsky 3 months ago

Am I missing something? I didnt see or hear anything about Rooser ramming anything. And why would he get the Navy Cross when he didnt do anything but observe what the other guy was doing below him?

@tommyanderson2034 3 months ago

How long can we drag out this story ?

@MikeMojo-w7k 4 months ago

Listening in Ramsey, NJ, USA. My father was stationed in England in the Army Air Corp. He was 0ne of the mechanics keeping the B-17s flying!!

@Bluswede 4 months ago

I've known of this incident since 1970 from the book Airwar, by Edward Jablonski. This pathetic AI telling of the tale serves only to set off healthy bullshit detectors, causing the baby to get tossed out with the bath water! Because of CRAP like this, there are going to be people who turn away from the true parts of the story.

AI crap like this really makes my ass itch!

@michaelst.pierre1187 3 months ago

The Japanese KI-45 Absolute Ceiling: Though the official service ceiling is 10,000m, the Ki-45's maximum theoretical altitude (absolute ceiling) was roughly 10,730 meters (35,200 feet). Not 38,000 feet as told in this fictionalized story. And at that altitude the KI-45's performance would have been just as compromised as the Corsair, or maybe worse.

@jerniganal29 3 months ago

Watching from near Columbia, Mississippi. Amazed at the courage demonstrated by these two pilots. The may have saved my grandfather’s life. He was on a ship nearby. He was a hero to me, not perfect, but neither am I. I loved him and he filled a gap in my life for which I am truly grateful.

@borg2752 3 months ago

I served in the Army twice: during the mid 70s and from 1989 to 2001. Currently living in Spain. What a story...edge of my seat! My dad was a Marine aboard the USS Missouri BB63 at Okinawa. Clingman and Roosevelt may have prevented the Mighty Mo from getting hit by more kamikazes. They were hit by two. Dad saw one hit one deck below his gun mount; close enough to see that the pilot was just a kid. So thanks to those fighter pilots, for watching out for my father.🎖️🇺🇸