It was for bombs, not speed. Here's right from General LeMay's autobiography: "...We had decided to take out the guns and gunners to make up for the shortage o

It was for bombs, not speed. Here's right from General LeMay's autobiography: "...We had decided to take out the guns and gunners to make up for the shortage of airplanes, because it would be another factor in helping increase the bombload. However, if the change to low altitude had been quite a step to take, then going in at low altitude with half a crew was something else!" The firebombing of Japan was done at low altitude, not high altitude. Do you have a source on heavy bombers over Japan dropping bombs on farmland and fleeing if attacked? That seems against almost every principal of bomber warfare. Lone bombers are much easier to kill than a formation, and an entire formation jettisoning bombs and abandoning their attack just because a few fighters showed up, or AA fire began is hard for me to comprehend.