[Alberta Special Issue on the 70th Anniversary of the Anti-Fascist Victory] Tintin: The Wind Rises

[Alberta Special Issue on the 70th Anniversary of the Anti-Fascist Victory] Tintin: The Wind Rises [Phoenix PEN] Tintin I don’t know where to start this story. Because I feel from the heart...

[Phoenix Pen Club] Tintin I don’t know where to start this story. Because from the bottom of my heart, it is an extremely complex film with strong and old emotions mixed with countless black and white pictures: compared to piecemeal essays written half a night, perhaps a million-word novel should be a more suitable genre.

The wind is blowing, try to survive.

However, I know that for this kind of mood, I must find a beginning of words.

The starting place is actually not too far from my current city of Phoenix, and can be reached within 2 hours by car. Although it is unlikely that I would just drive there now when I am in the mood? I can still open Google Maps, search for "Airplane Graveyard", switch to satellite mode, and use the mouse to zoom in on the strange and neat rows of queues bit by bit. Zoom in, zoom in, and zoom in again, and you'll suddenly realize that these are planes one after another: this is the famous airplane cemetery in Arizona. There are nearly 4,000 airplanes in total, lying there quietly, no longer flying, no longer paying attention to the changes of the years, quiet and peaceful.

Although I am only facing the screen, in the satellite mode map, I am actually facing a corner of the earth, overlooking them leisurely. Frankly, I envy them. In the last years of their lives, they just stopped the pace of the clock, without the suffering of illness or the sadness of parting. In the dry climate of the desert, except for a slight dust, their appearance is exactly the same as when they were young. In my imagination, I can even walk among those airplanes that look young but are old at heart. Of course, I am not a real aviation enthusiast at all: those who are avid enthusiasts should be able to recognize various old models at a glance: P40, B25, Ki-84... In fact, in my eyes, they are just various aircraft. But there is only one model, and I think I can still recognize it at a glance.

It is the Zero fighter.

It is a myth, a myth that actually existed.

The wind is blowing, try to survive.

After the Chinese government moved the capital to Chongqing during World War II, Japan’s aerial bombing of Chongqing could be said to have never stopped. Although air strikes are much more convenient than army attacks, the foggy climate in Chongqing and Sichuan makes Japanese bombers often lose their targets and can only drop bombs indiscriminately. Moreover, they are often intercepted by Chinese fighter jets in flight, causing considerable losses one after another. The round trip distance from the occupied Hankou base to Chongqing was close to 2,000 kilometers, far exceeding the maximum range of the Mitsubishi Type 96, Japan's main fighter at the time. Before the emergence of the Zero fighter, although China's air force did not have much advantage over Japan, it was still in a state of being able to confront Japan. The Chinese Air Force had even been planning to concentrate its air superiority forces in a war of annihilation. The Zero fighter formation has been sighted several times over China and has been analyzed as a possible new bomber. Under this premise, on September 13, 34 fighter jets from the Third Group of the Chinese Air Force and 13 Zero fighter jets from the Japanese 12th Air Force formally encountered each other over Bishan, Chongqing.

This myth began on September 13, 1940, in the sky over Bishan, Chongqing, China.

This is by no means a reciprocal air battle: most of the Chinese Air Force are old Soviet fighters. The huge gap in performance between the two aircraft can be compared to the gap between boxing champion Tyson and a kindergarten child at his best. This aerial battle was just like 34 weak children rushing towards 13 powerful boxing champion Tyson without hesitation. But what is heartbreaking is that the children who are rushing towards the boxing championship know nothing about such a powerful opponent. In fact, compared to the Japanese pilots who are still familiar with the performance of the aircraft, the Chinese pilots actually have richer air combat experience. But these experiences are still just like the experiences of kindergarten children who have had group fights. They soon discovered that it was actually worse than nothing.

First of all, they were surprised by the opponent's unrivaled mobility: the previous tail-biting pursuit tactics were completely ineffective. Instead, they would be bitten back by the opponent in an instant like a swift beast. They had no idea how the opponent could achieve such a small turning radius. Then the bullets around the protective steel plate kept ringing mercilessly, and no matter how hard they persisted, left or right, they could not escape the fate of being shot down. Some experienced Chinese pilots turned sharply and fell before they were able to escape. In this way, they could only watch their comrades falling from high altitudes one by one at low altitudes. However, they endured the heartache and still dodged and entangled in the periphery. They actually had good reasons in their hearts. You can't beat the opponent if you go up now, but if the opponent fights for a long time, he will always be "tired", right?

From Hankou to Chongqing for a long-range attack, the opponent must leave a certain amount of fuel to return: it should be effective to pester the opponent when they return. However, the Chinese pilot's judgment was still terribly wrong. The boxing champion easily killed two children with his punches, and he would not be tired when facing a third one again. Compared with all other fighters at the time, the Zero fighter had both high maneuverability and long endurance. When the Chinese planes who had escaped to the periphery turned around and swarmed forward, they were still met with steel-like brutal punches, without any loss of strength.

This is a naked killing, an aerial killing of a child by an active boxing champion.

The Japanese counted that China had shot down 27 fighter jets of various types; while the Chinese counted that they had shot down 24. One thing is the same. The conclusions of both sides are the same. Those strong and proud boxing champions, the 13 Zero fighters that first tried their skills, left the battlefield without any damage, and only one was accidentally damaged on the return flight.

The Chinese Air Force suffered heavy losses over Bishan. Chennault, a consultant to the China Aviation Commission (by the way, the secretary-general of the China Aviation Commission is Song Meiling), was organizing the American Volunteer Air Force to aid China back and forth between China and the United States. He officially reported Japan's new fighter aircraft to the US military, but it did not attract much attention at the time. The Japanese's new fighter planes were no more terrifying in the eyes of the U.S. military than the Japanese carp streamers, and Chennault's report was shelved. Chennault, who stayed on the Chinese battlefield, could only draw useful experience from painful battle losses and analyze the weaknesses of the Zero fighter.

Looking back, in the Sino-Japanese air battle, which was already an extremely disadvantageous chess game, Chennault was definitely a comeback master. After a few encounters and harassment tests against Zero fighters, he summarized several tactics to deal with Zero fighters, which greatly reduced the battle losses of the Chinese Air Force and Flying Tigers to Zero fighters. These tactics include sudden approach, rapid fire, and the last and most important point is to hit and run, even if you can't hit and run.

Traditionally, this type of hit-and-run tactic is a cowardly act that shakes military morale. Even the British Royal Naval Air Force would be sent to a military court if they did this. Chennault himself should have known, but he didn't care at all. In accordance with his request, the Chinese Air Force and Flying Tigers suddenly sprang out to open fire, dived immediately, and then fled like cowards without looking back. Although the enemy-killing ratio is not high and the enemy is mainly harassed, the constant harassment also makes the Japanese army feel very troublesome. More importantly: countless Chinese and American pilots who have survived in the skies over China should be grateful to Chennault.

The wind is blowing, try to survive.

After Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, the Pacific War broke out. Chennault's reports and experiences remained unknown. In the early days of the Pacific War between Japan and the United States, Zero fighters quickly dominated the skies. At that time, Japan had only 300 Zeros in total, and 250 were deployed in the Pacific battlefield. However, it destroyed two-thirds of the Allied fighters within a few months. The turning point of the entire war situation and the end of the myth began with the death of a Japanese naval air force commander named Tadayoshi Oga (some say Koga) on June 3, 1942.

Oga was piloting a Zero fighter plane and found a fuel leak on the way back, and had to make an emergency landing on a desert island in the sea. After landing, the soft soil sank quickly after heavy rain, and the fuselage fell violently, breaking the neck of Xiaoga who was sitting on the seat. Five weeks later, an American search team discovered the plane that had crashed on the desert island and Xiaoga's body still stuck in the seat. The most important thing is that this Zero fighter was intact except for two holes in the fuel tank that were punctured by ground machine gunfire.

After Oga's aircraft was tested as many as 24 times by senior American pilots, the secret of the Zero was completely cracked. The U.S. military has designed new fighters with targets, and existing aircraft also have good tactics to get rid of the Zero's pursuit: turn right at high speed or dive. This tactic is basically consistent with Chennault's judgment based on binoculars and descriptions of surviving pilots. After the F6F, which was no less maneuverable than the Zero and had stronger firepower, thicker armor, and higher speed, was quickly put on the battlefield, the Zero was completely reduced to a foil on the battlefield. By the end of the war, the Zero was merely a suicide weapon for kamikaze squads.

The wind is blowing, try to survive.

”Le vent se leve!?nbsp;ilfauttenter de vivre!”

This somewhat confused and melancholy poem comes from "Le cimetieremarin" by French poet Paul Valery. Without context, this poem is actually somewhat incomprehensible. However, this endless poem appears and disappears in the work "The Wind Rises" (Japanese: 风立ちぬ) by the Japanese novelist Hori Tatsuo. It is like a slender spider thread in the storm. You can hardly see it but you know its existence: it is just a thin connection but it has never been disconnected. The Chinese name for the movie adapted from this novel is "The Passing Wind and Remembrance of Dreams", which was a neglected work by Yamaguchi Momoe and Miura Yuwa when they were in their prime. The two people who can be called happy in real life perform tragedy as always in the film: Momoe died of lung disease before the end of the war, and Miura returned to Tokyo after the war, only one person can always recall the smile of his lover.

The name of Miyazaki Hayao's animated film is also called "The Wind Rises", or it can also be translated as "The Wind Rises". This film is not a simple adaptation, but a fusion of Hori Tatsuo's two novels "The Wind Rises" and "Nahoko" as well as the life story of Zero aircraft designer Horikoshi Jiro. Two novels and one person's life first appeared in his comic series, and then were all condensed into an animated film. The main line of the film has always seemed vague, and even the live shots of the Zero plane only flashed by at the end. Frankly speaking, Hayao Miyazaki doesn't seem to want to be understood at all. He probably just wants to leave a work that shows life.

What is life? Can it be shown in the length of a video? Hayao Miyazaki almost used the technique of quick recall before death to fragment the life of Jiro Horikoshi and the entire story of the two novels. Planes of various shapes, dark skies, sudden earthquakes, city crowds, the cruelty of war, and even the incomparably beautiful Naoko – many women in Hayao Miyazaki’s animations are cute and beautiful, but few are so beautiful and so desolate that it breaks your heart.

The talented fighter designer Jiro Horikoshi passed away in 1982.

Oga's Zero fighter has been properly repaired and maintained by the US military, and may be the only existing Zero that can take off. Later, it was transported to the Tokorozawa Aviation Historical Memorial Museum in Tokorozawa City, Saitama Prefecture, Japan, where it was re-launched by retired US military pilots in front of more than 500 aviation enthusiasts from around the world.

The wind is blowing, try to survive.

———-

Background introduction: Miyazaki hayao is a Japanese animation director and cartoonist. "The Wind Rises" is an animated film adapted from his own comic book series, and it is also the last film he directed. Because the story involves the life of the Zero fighter designer, the work received mixed reviews. However, I feel that what thousands of ordinary or extraordinary people can do in the storm of war is just to survive. Our commemoration of war cannot, and should never, simply point to hatred - that would only sow the seeds of another war in our hearts. To end, I hope to freeze this scene in front of your eyes: when the retired US military pilot lifted Xiaohe's Zero into the air, several old Japanese aviation soldiers who came to the scene leaned on crutches and burst into tears.

To millions of ordinary or extraordinary people, today's peace is so precious.