The official death toll was some 83,000, but historians generally agree that victims unaccounted for bring the figure to around 100,000 -- overwhelmingly civilians. Where earlier raids targeted aircraft factories and military facilities, the Tokyo firebombing was aimed largely at civilians, in places including Tokyo's downtown area known as shitamachi, where people lived in traditional wood and paper homes at densities sometimes exceeding 100,000 people per square mile. "I can see myself there, the flames all around me. The saturation bombing of Japan took much fiercer tolls and wrought far and away more havoc than the atomic bomb. "Civilians are defenseless, and this is what it is like when they are killed," said Kanoh, who was 14 at the time and lost both parents and two younger sisters. We don't want clicks or ad dollars. "It was a hellish frenzy, absolutely horrible. The March 10, 1945, attack on Tokyo killed more people than the Aug. 9 atomic bombing of Nagasaki. How does people were killed more in Tokyo than two nukes? 1945 Tokyo Firebombing Left Legacy of Terror, Pain. "It was as if the world had ended," said Nihei, whose father sheltered her under his body, as others piled on top and were burned and suffocated. Every day of the week, we publish the most important breaking news & views for the progressive community. But perhaps 2020 will be the wake-up call our planet needed to come together. Via History.com On this day, U.S. warplanes launch a new bombing offensive against Japan, dropping 2,000 tons of incendiary bombs on Tokyo over the course of the next 48 hours. Can somebody give me an estimate number differences between Tokyo and two A-bombs? I don't think we'll still be around for the 80th anniversary," Ohtake said. On March 10, 1945, U.S. B-29 bombers flew over Tokyo in the dead of night, dumping massive payloads of cluster bombs equipped with a then-recent invention: napalm. Although the precise death toll is unknown, conservative estimates suggest that the firestorm caused by incendiary bombs killed at least 80,000 people, and likely more than 100,000, in a single night; some one million people were left homeless. What is true about the firebombing of Tokyo? But I was numb to that by then," she said. Our Mission:To inform. By dawn, more than 100,000 people were dead, a million were homeless, and 40 square kilometers of Tokyo were burned to the ground. An estimated 100,000 people perished in the firebomb raid on Tokyo in the night of March 9-10, 1945. It was hard to understand how so many bodies could be piled up like that," said Ohtake. Such massive groups of B-29s could be heard and tracked from a considerable distance. The Tokyo firebombing raid was a relatively slow (compared to an atomic bomb), massively-distributed attack. 70 years on, the fire-bombing of Tokyo remains the deadliest bombing campaign in history "The Americans certainly weren't out of step in that sense.". Survivors say Japan has been slow to come to terms with the bombing's place in history, in part because of the reticence of survivors. The Tokyo Fire-Bombing: "The night of March 9, 1945, began typically enough for war-weary Tokyo residents. A total of 267,171 buildings were destroyed, a quarter of all of the buildings in Tokyo… Common Dreams has been providing breaking news & views for the progressive community since 1997. The Asahi Shimbun. The firebombing of Tokyo on the night of March 9-10, 1945 touched off the wave of firebombing that destroyed 64 Japanese cities and culminated in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Split-second choices like that determined who lived and who died. TOKYO -- For decades, Teruo Kanoh never revealed the terror locked in his heart the night in 1945 when American bombs turned Tokyo into a raging fireball. WAR CRIMES: US TERROR ATTACK ON TOKYO This 1945 photo shows the industrial section of Tokyo along the Sumida River. A small museum devoted to the attack, the Center of the Tokyo Raid and War Damages, opened near the center of the disaster zone in 2002, and has been renovated for the 60th anniversary. "We civilians had no weapons and no strength to fight," Kiyo-oka said. The firebombing of Tokyo was the single deadliest air raid in history Feb 28, 2017 Domagoj Valjak The 1945 bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were definitely among the worst atrocities committed during the World War II. The death toll was on par with the Aug. 6 atomic attack on Hiroshima. To remain an independent news source, we do not advertise, sell subscriptions or accept corporate contributions. Survivors of the Tokyo firebombing feel their pain has been forgotten, by history and by the government. "It was a blazing firestorm. More people were killed in the Tokyo firebombing of March 9-10 than in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki five months later. Please support our nonprofit journalism and help us start 2021 at full strength. The bombings took place in Tokyo on the nights of the 9th and 10th of March 1945. The firebombing of Japanese cities, notably Tokyo, and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I saw a baby catch fire on its mother's back, and she couldn't put out the fire. But the attack, and similar ones that followed in more than 60 other Japanese cities, have received little attention, eclipsed by the atomic bombings and Japan's postwar rush to rebuild. For mercy, see an aged Spanish ballerina with Alzheimer's dance to Swan Lake from her wheelchair - grace, grit, hope, sorrow incarnate. July 1943 sorties over Hamburg killed 43,000. 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