80 Years On: How The US B-29 Superfortress Helped End WWII

By the time the B-29 Superfortress came into service in May 1944, the outcome of the war was arguably already set. Instead of being used to bomb a rapidly collapsing Germany, they were deployed to the Pacific. There, they firebombed Tokyo, razing city after city to the ground, before pushing Japan to surrender after dropping the atomic bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Today, it’s been 80 years since the official end of World War II, with the War in the Pacific coming to an end on September 2, 1945 (although the Japanese Emperor had announced the surrender a couple of weeks prior on August 14).