Looking for Evidence

Neither pilot had either a gun camera or independent observer confirmation of what they said they did that day.

At the 1988 Yamamoto Retrospective in Fredericksburg, TX, George Chandler asked Cargill Hall if the Office of Air Force History had made any efforts to examine the wreckage of the Yamamoto bomber? It seemed that physical evidence would prove or disprove the statements made by the two pilots, i.e.,Barber and Lanphier. If the right wing had not been shot off in flight, it would conclusively prove that Lanphier did not attack the Yamamoto airplane.

Cargill Hall responded saying that there had been no effort by the Office of Air Force History to examine the wreckage and it would be too expensive to do so. George Chandler told him that it would look like a very easy mission for a crash investigating team to fly from Clark Field in the Philippines to the commercial airport in Bougainville and there take a helicopter from the mining company and go into the wreckage and they could then prove what happened or did not happen. Chandler then asked Cargill Hall the direct question, “If I take a team, including a qualified crash investigating engineer, to the wreckage site in Bougainville, will you convene a new Victory Credit Board to review the evidence that we bring?” Cargill Hall declined to respond to that question. At that moment, he knew that both wings were still attached to the Yamamoto bomber as it entered the jungle and the left wing was torn off by impact with a tree and the right wing was immediately adjacent to the fuselage and right engine.

R. Cargill Hall, as Chief of Research for the Office of Air Force History, was professionally dishonest when he did not share with SYMA that he and Dr. Kohn already knew that neither wing of the Yamamoto bomber had been shot off in flight. Of course, it would have been unfair to let SYMA make an expensive trip to the Bougainville jungle to find information that he already knew. But even more damning is the fact that he knew the Yamamoto bomber did not have a wing shot off and thus he knew that Lanphier could not have attacked the Yamamoto bomber but he and Dr. Kohn were determined to preserve the half credit to each pilot.

Was there pressure being brought to bear on Dr. Kohn, Chief, Office of Air Force History, and R. Cargill Hall, Chief, Research Division, Office of Air Force History, that they should not do any thing to change the half credit to each pilot? Or, did they make that decision themselves and stonewall all efforts and display of facts to prove that Lanphier did not attack the Yamamoto airplane?