The Daily Alaska empire., 1950-04-07
JAP RELATES 5UB5RANGED
 WEST COAST
By o. H. F. KING

TOKYO. April 7-4R-A leading Japanese submarine commander ol World War II says that plane carrying submarines crossed the Pa cific at will early in the war.
 Meiji Tagami. a former subma- rine commander who made three such trips. told the Associated Press in an exclusive interview that he submarines and planes made at Jacks all the way from Alaska to Southern California.
 The main purpose. he said, was to sink as much US. shipping as possible, harass West Coast ports, and stir up the citizens. But at east one mission he described as a retaliation for the Doolittle bomb- ing of major Japanese cities"
 Tagami claims his submarine sans heavy cruiser and shelled Port Stevens at the mouth of the Colum- oia River, while his submarines plane flew over Oregon to attempt to set forest fires.
 CThe Forest Service in Oregon said ont fire was set and easily put out. The shells aimed at Fort Stevens landed far from an install lations.)
 Six Special Bombs
 He declared at least l2 other Japanese submarines carried planes to the West Coast and attempted missions.
 Tagami said the Doolittle re- taliation mission required the con- struction of six special :ncendiary bombs. Rear Adm. Fumio Shimizu. then Chief of Navl Ordnance who acted as interpreter at the inter view. said the bombs were made at his order.
 On Aug. IS, 1942, four months after the Doolittle raid. Tagamfs I-25 submarine left Yokohama on it's third mission to the United States.
 The submarine surfaced seven miles from the Oregon coast Sept. l5 and catapulted plane piloted by Sgt. Nobuo Fujita. Fujita reported he dropped four of the six bombs and was sure two started forest fires.
 Tagami said on the return voyage an American submarine was tor pedoed and sunk in the Aleutians Another submarine sighted him ana fired on the I-25 with machinegun bullets. He said it was the only time in six crossings that enemy war craft were encountered.
 Claims Cruiser
 Tagami related that the cruiser which he says he sank was en- countered later between the Japa- nese naval base of Truk and the New Hebrides.
 Tagami did not say why Japanese submarine activity on the West Coast dwindled less than a year after war began, but Navy historian Samuel Eliot Morrison did.
 Morrison, now in Japan, told the Associated Press the Japanese Army insisted the submarines be brought closer home to supply island out posts as the United States began it's Pacific comeback.
 "As our island-hopping campaign advanced more and more" Morrison said, Japanese submarines became mere provision carriers"
 Morrison showed interest in Ta- gamis story and related two incl dents which the Japanese did not mention or was unaware of.
 Morrison said a plane from a Jap anese submarine secuted Puget Sound and flew over Seattle about May 28, 1942. Another submarine launched plane secuted Pearl Har- Dor in October of l943.
 Tagami said his and four other submarines were outside Pearl Har- Dor the morning of the attack on Dec. q l941, that plunged the United States into war.
 Morrison discounted the value ol. the plane-carrying submarines as a weapon.
 He said the cumbersome, cylindri- cal hangar on the deck hindered the submarines maneuverability. The however, had a program for building 18 huge submarines each capable of carrying three planes, and had three finished when the war ended.