https://amp.freep.com/amp/4111349002How the Japanese bombed Michigan during World War IINovember marks the 75th anniversary of the start of an unusual, mostly unknown chapter of World War II — Operation Fu-Go, the Japanese launching of more than 9,300 large, bomb-laden, hydrogen balloons, carried east across the Pacific Ocean by the jet stream at high altitudes to cause destruction and chaos in the U.S. and Canada.
The effort mostly failed, though about 280 of the balloons or their components were later found in North America, with the two easternmost discoveries being in Michigan — at North Dorr and another discovered near 8 Mile and Gill roads in Farmington the following month.
The balloon attacks went almost completely uncovered in the U.S. news media at the time — because the U.S. War Department wanted it that way. American media largely adhered to a request from the federal government's Office of Censorship to not publicize the balloon findings.
"It was a different era," said Ross Coen, an assistant professor of history at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks and author of "Fu-Go: The Curious History of Japan's Balloon Bomb Attack on America."
"They didn’t want there to be panic in the streets over bombs raining down silently from the skies all over the United States. But also, they wanted to deny the Japanese any sort of intelligence on where and when these balloons were landing — information that could be used to better perfect their flights on later balloon launches."
I was aware, previously, of this attempted fire-bomb-by-balloon attack. I think there were a couple of minor fires in Oregon, as well as a few civilians there who were killed or injured. I did not know, however, the balloons got as far inland as Michigan.
There were also a few more, direct, attacks by the Japanese on the US. Early in the war a Japanese submarine briefly bombarded an oil field in southern California. In June 1942 a Japanese submarine briefly bombarded a fort at the mouth of the Columbia River, and in September the same sub tried to start a forest fire in southern Oregon by having it seaplane drop an incendiary bomb.
https://sos.oregon.gov/archives/exhibits/ww2/Pages/threats-bombs.aspx
