Operator #5, June 1934 story

This is only one story from the issue. The reason I got the story was because it is entitled 'The Yellow Scourge' and concerns an oriental invasion of the United States.

For anyone who has studied the history of pre-war West Coast U.S., there is a wealth of information about how much anti-Japanese prejudice there was in that area. The Chinese had been the first group to suffer major prejudice, and later it became the Japanese. This prejudice made it much easier for the government to round up persons of Japanese ancestry at the start of the war and move them out to interment camps in the middle of the country.

Although this story does not directly identify the aggressors as being Japanese specifically, it's obvious that they are. Note that his story is from 1934, a full seven years before the attack on Pearl Harbor. The story is also in a couple of accidental predictions it makes about the future.

Operator #5 is a government agent, sort of like James Bond, but very ultra-secret and never acknowledged officially by the government.

I will point out some specific interesting parts of the story. If you want the entire story, you can download it at The Vintage Library.

The story opens with the Japanese fleet and the U.S. fleet off the West Coast in what is supposed to be a friendly meeting. Admiral Ogoro is the head of the fleets of the 'Yellow Empire,' as Japan is being referred to. Naval Affairs Office Otuski is another Japanese-sounding name that is used. Yet another hint that the 'Yellow Empire' is Japan is the name of a battleship, the Kora.

Operator #5 notices that the Kora is not the new battleship that it is supposed to be.

Planes attack, and they are counterfeit U.S. planes. The Yellow Fleet is basically starting a war by faking a U.S. attack on the ships of the Yellow Fleet, plus faking numbers of documents. They plan to isolate the U.S. from other allies by getting the allies mad at the U.S.

There's also some kind of super-sub that the U.S. had built, and that had been taken over by operatives of the Yellow Empire.

The reason for the attacks is that the Yellow Empire wants to avoid currency inflation, so they plan to ransack the U.S. for its gold.

An interesting quote: 'That's the damnable cleverness of the Yellow Empire! They strike first and declare war afterward.' Note that, again, this is years before Pearl Harbor, yet his is exactly what actually happened; they attacked, and then war was declared. (Actually, it was supposed to be the other way, but problems with the Japanese representatives in Washington and their translating a message resulted in the message of war being delivered after the attack began, rather than before, as it was supposed to be done.)

There is, of course, a clever female Yellow Empire spy that plays a major part in the story.

The Yellow Empire ambassador presents a declaration of war, and Congress is called into session to declare war, again, exactly what happened.

In this story, Los Angeles is bombed. This reflects the worry of many people living on the West Coast that the Japanese would attack the West Coast. There was, in fact, something called 'The Battle of Los Angeles' in which a lot of anti-aircraft firing was done, shooting at either nothing, a Japanese plane or planes, or a UFO, depending on whose account you read.

The Yellow Empire threatens to use poison gas and incendiary bombs. In reality, the incendiary bombs were used against Japan and, fortunately, neither country used much poison gas in the war itself, although that was a different case in China.

In the story, Yellow Empire troops are in Mexico and are moving on the U.S., and they also attack the Panama Canal. The second was logical, but the first was based on actual rumors of Japanese troops in Mexico.

There is also a form of a Doolittle raid, where Operator #5 leads a group of bombers on a flight from the West Coast directly to Japan (considerably further than the Doolittle raid), in an effort to expose the Yellow Empire lies and to bomb some of their ships. The planes and crew were given very little chance of every coming back. This was also being done, as in the real bombing, with virtually no actual U.S. advanced on the enemy islands.

Operator #5 has also designed something called 'radio rockets' which are placed into position along the Panama Canal. When the Yellow Fleet attacks, the rockets are fired and receive course corrections from a plane flying high above. They they fly into the Yellow Empire ships and destroy them. This is, in effect, an early version of the cruise missile. Being before computers, the missiles had to be radio-controlled and a plane had to be used to guide them, but, otherwise, they are very similar to present-day missiles.

Thanks to the brave efforts of the U.S. forces, and the almost super-human actions of Operator #4, the Yellow Fleet attack is repulsed, and the Yellow Fleet is scattered and driven off.

The war ends, and then the U.S. receives a cable from the Emperor who apologizes for the war, and he blames the war on the 'duplicity of our staff of war.' In other words, it was the militarists that were behind the war, and the Emperor had nothing to do with it, just as was claimed at the end of the actual war.

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