Political Quotes

“Fellow Members, today I recognize a distinguished American hero, Lieutenant Colonel Robert Hite of Camden, AK, who died last month at the age of 95. Just months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, on December 7, 1941, a group of courageous young pilots flew Army Air Forces bombers off the deck of the USS Hornet in the Pacific Ocean to carry out a dangerous, low-altitude bombing attack on Japan's home islands. The Doolittle Raid provided an enormous morale boost for Americans with a crushing blow to the imperial regime in Tokyo. Among these brave men was an Arkansan, Colonel Robert L. Hite. Colonel Hite had enlisted as an aviation cadet on September 9, 1940. He was later commissioned as a second lieutenant and rated as a pilot on May 29, 1941. Almost bumped from the mission because of space limitations, Colonel Hite was assigned as a copilot ultimately to the B-25 ``Bat Out of Hell.'' He rejected his fellow airmen's attempts to buy his spot on the plane and launched his mission on April 19, 1942. Lieutenant Colonel Hite's aircraft successfully carried out a low- level bombing run on an aircraft factory and fuel depot in Nagoya, Japan, but inclement weather forced the crew to bail out over Japanese- controlled territory as their plane ran low on fuel. Lieutenant Colonel Hite landed in a Japanese rice paddy field, where he was captured and sentenced to execution.…”