On March 21, 1945, the first mission involving an Ohka was launched but proved a failure when the G4M Betty's were intercepted by American fighters. The Ohka's on hand were released too far from the target and fell harmlessly into the sea. Again, attacks were flown towards the battleship USS West Virginia and a her screen - consisting of three ships - were hit along with the USS West Virginia, though inflicting only minor damage.
At Radar Picket Station 14 off of Okinawa on April 12, 1945, the destroyer USS Mannert L. Abele had been hit by a Mitsubishi A6M "Zero" kamikaze fighter. The resulting damage had broken both of her shafts and she now found herself on fire and dead in the water. Five minutes later, three G4M Betty bombers were spotted approaching the vessel at 20,000 feet up. Unknown to the crew of the Abele, the G4Ms carried the new single-seat, piloted flying bombs in their open bomb bays. The three Betty's approach the crippled destroyer and one Ohka was dropped from 20,000 feet, starting its run as an unpowered glider weapon and then picking up additional speed by the time the Ohka reached wave top level. One minute from impact, the pilot switched on the third rocket and headed for the Abele's starboard quarter at approximately 500 miles per hour. The crew onboard the Abele saw the object and recalled it looking mush like a flying torpedo. The Abele's guns opened fire. Due to damage from the previous action, her 5 inch gun mounts could not move and fire against the approaching danger. The 20mm and 40 mm guns opened fire as the Ohka pilot steered his aircraft using a simple large cross hair sight mounted to front of the canopy - at these speeds, a small aiming error could have the aircraft miss the target altogether. The Ohka hit the destroyer amidships and blew the ship apart. In less than three minutes, the Abele sank, taking seventy-nine American sailors down into the blue. Of course the pilot of the Ohka saw the same fate.
In practice, the Ohka did not deliver the intended psychological or logistical results as planned. The system was produced up until March of 1945 and, though several Allied vessels were hit directly by Ohkas, the weapon system never caused much in the way of overwhelming danger to the fleet. Considering the amount of defensive and offensive firepower available to even single US Navy vessels, this was not totally a surprise. If anything, the mother ships used in transportation of Ohkas proved the juicier target for the Allies and Ohka's were as deadly as their other kamikaze brethren only when accurate.
In all, the record of the entire Ohka program was judged as a failure with just one ship sunk, two damaged beyond repair and three others damaged - only seven ships total were damaged by war's end. Seven other variants were built and tested to be launched from caves or submarines or towed bombers instead of being attached to them. However, only the Type 11 went on to see serious combat action. The United States Navy gave the suicide aircraft the name "Baka" - a Japanese word for fool - obviously not sharing the Japanese sentiment of suicide as a part of warfare and honor.
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