Japanese WWII newsreel archives from NHK

[HazeGrayUnderway]

Recently ran into a video on YT that cleaned up an old WWII-era Japanese newsreel.  He got the footage from NHK.  NHK is the Japanese Broadcasting Corporation (Nippon Hōsō Kyōkai) and has been operating ever since 1924.  To this day it's one of major figures in Japanese broadcasting.

 

Below is the video that I ran into, bringing the archive into my attention.

Below is the archive link.  There's newsreels going into the 2000s but the bulk of the archive is the 1940s.

https://www2.nhk.or.jp/archives/shogenarchives/jpnews/list.cgi?cat=1940

No subtitling or another language dubbed over.

[Charon2018]

Pacific Profiles Volume 5 is a good publication about the Rabaul Zeros.

[Sabot_100]

Noticed one thing in the video. Near the end they are showing the celebrations and they cut to the big chalk board showing in the lower right corner various US aircraft (ie P-38) and I assume how many they shot down. Besides the fact that the totals are probably bogus (it is a propaganda film after all) I was surprised that the names would be the in English and the same as the Americans would use. I would have thought they would have their own versions of Zero, Zeke, Betty, Kate, etc.to describe US aircraft.

Also wondered if the film had been colorized or was it originally in color?

[Murotsu]

At about 1:50 you see the Zero's in the doctrinal Japanese three trailing formation.  I thought I should point that out.

[HazeGrayUnderway]

1 hour ago, Sabot_100 said:

Noticed one thing in the video. Near the end they are showing the celebrations and they cut to the big chalk board showing in the lower right corner various US aircraft (ie P-38) and I assume how many they shot down. Besides the fact that the totals are probably bogus (it is a propaganda film after all) I was surprised that the names would be the in English and the same as the Americans would use. I would have thought they would have their own versions of Zero, Zeke, Betty, Kate, etc.to describe US aircraft.

Also wondered if the film had been colorized or was it originally in color?

In "Japanese Destroyer Captain" the author Capt Hara noted how a lot of the information even at the frontline they were getting was totally wrong.

 

Incorrect spotting reports, even during Coral Sea where an American oiler was misidentified as a carrier.  It's interesting because this was done at a time when the quality of IJN aviators was still very high at that stage of the war.  When the war worsened and the veteran aircrews became scarcer, Hara said the reports from their patrol aircraft got more unreliable.

Destroyers being identified as a Battleship and Cruisers, relayed to an IJN RAdm nearby leading a formation, who is now s****ing his pants, compromising his decision-making.

 

As for air-to-air kills, air forces tend to scrutinize those claims.  All sides have had overclaims but again, it tends to get nitpicked.

 

However, something started happening with the Japanese as the war progressed and their fortunes worsened.  A number of these overclaims were happening with the Japanese.  Some of the leaders at the intermediate level would see these reports and pass it along knowing it's bogus.  They don't say anything.  In "Japanese Destroyer Captain," Captain Hara says they don't question them because the men are working hard, and didn't want to demoralize them by questioning their efforts.  This has disastrous effects because leaders at higher echelons are then fed terrible information for which they have to base their plans on.

====

To provide a great example of overlclaims is the report filed for the Battle of Tassafaronga.  The American Navy suffered very severe losses in that battle despite having an absolutely superior force, having the advantage of surprise, radar, excellent forewarning, etc.  The Japanese force under RAdm Tanaka should have been annihilated, instead only 1 IJN DD was lost for the cost of 1 USN CA sunk and 3 CAs badly damaged.  It was a s***show.  RAdm Wright, the commanding officer of the American force, in his after-action report claimed that they sunk 4 DDs and damaged 2 more.  He was clearly covering his own butt.

Tanaka, the true winner of the fight, claimed he sank a Battleship and 2 Cruisers.

28 minutes ago, Murotsu said:

At about 1:50 you see the Zero's in the doctrinal Japanese three trailing formation.  I thought I should point that out.

Was that a practice for early stages of WWII for them, and would not mesh with a 1944 era of IJN aviation?  Not a big expert on aviation formations, but I do recall different air forces went with different ones, and possibly even changed during the war.

[DrHolmes52]

7 hours ago, HazeGrayUnderway said:

 

 

As for air-to-air kills, air forces tend to scrutinize those claims.  All sides have had overclaims but again, it tends to get nitpicked.

 

If I recall, the immediate post battle reports for both sides would often claim more plane kills than were actually involved in the fight.

[HazeGrayUnderway]

3 hours ago, DrHolmes52 said:

If I recall, the immediate post battle reports for both sides would often claim more plane kills than were actually involved in the fight.

Yep.  I've even ran into cases of that happening in the the Mediterranean Theater.  In the west there tends to be heavier scrutiny but overclaims still happened.  In 1943 the Luftwaffe conducted desperate flights with their airlift to resupply Axis forces in Tunisia who were cornered.  The Western Allied air forces combined and massacred the German aircraft and the claims were absurd.  It needed serious reality checks.  The Palm Sunday Massacre of German airlift had a claim of 146 kills by the Allies when the Germans actually lost 58.  Don't get me wrong, those losses were substantial, and with the Germans coming hot off their defeat at Stalingrad, this was a dire event (and it was soon going to get worse, several times over), but the Allied claims were way too much.

 

[Murotsu]

12 hours ago, HazeGrayUnderway said:

In "Japanese Destroyer Captain" the author Capt Hara noted how a lot of the information even at the frontline they were getting was totally wrong.

 

Incorrect spotting reports, even during Coral Sea where an American oiler was misidentified as a carrier.  It's interesting because this was done at a time when the quality of IJN aviators was still very high at that stage of the war.  When the war worsened and the veteran aircrews became scarcer, Hara said the reports from their patrol aircraft got more unreliable.

Destroyers being identified as a Battleship and Cruisers, relayed to an IJN RAdm nearby leading a formation, who is now s****ing his pants, compromising his decision-making.

 

As for air-to-air kills, air forces tend to scrutinize those claims.  All sides have had overclaims but again, it tends to get nitpicked.

 

However, something started happening with the Japanese as the war progressed and their fortunes worsened.  A number of these overclaims were happening with the Japanese.  Some of the leaders at the intermediate level would see these reports and pass it along knowing it's bogus.  They don't say anything.  In "Japanese Destroyer Captain," Captain Hara says they don't question them because the men are working hard, and didn't want to demoralize them by questioning their efforts.  This has disastrous effects because leaders at higher echelons are then fed terrible information for which they have to base their plans on.

====

To provide a great example of overlclaims is the report filed for the Battle of Tassafaronga.  The American Navy suffered very severe losses in that battle despite having an absolutely superior force, having the advantage of surprise, radar, excellent forewarning, etc.  The Japanese force under RAdm Tanaka should have been annihilated, instead only 1 IJN DD was lost for the cost of 1 USN CA sunk and 3 CAs badly damaged.  It was a s***show.  RAdm Wright, the commanding officer of the American force, in his after-action report claimed that they sunk 4 DDs and damaged 2 more.  He was clearly covering his own butt.

Tanaka, the true winner of the fight, claimed he sank a Battleship and 2 Cruisers.

Was that a practice for early stages of WWII for them, and would not mesh with a 1944 era of IJN aviation?  Not a big expert on aviation formations, but I do recall different air forces went with different ones, and possibly even changed during the war.

The Japanese didn't do the 'finger four' two teams of two planes formation but rather stuck with the "trailing three" formation.  There might have been individual units that decided to do something different but that was the 'official' formation for fighters.  Bombers flew in a V of V's with three planes making up each individual V in the larger formation.