Hello and welcome to conflicted, the history podcast where we talk about the struggles that

shaped us, the tough questions that they pose and why we should care about any of it.

Conflicted is a member of the Evergreen Podcast Network, and as always, I'm your host, Zach

Cornwell. Today's episode is taking us to the mid-20th century, to a little conflict you may have

heard of before, World War II.

Now, in full transparency, I generally try and avoid the Second World War on this show.

Not because it isn't totally fascinating and engrossing.

I, like every other history nerd on the planet, love World War II.

But it tends to dominate history coverage in a way that few other topics do.

It sucks up a lot of oxygen, pulling interest away from lesser known yet equally fascinating topics.

But I decided to make an exception for this episode because it's a story that I've had my eye on for a while.

Today, we're going to be talking about something called Operation Vengeance.

Operation Vengeance was a military operation conducted by the United States to achieve the death of one man,

not the capture of a piece of territory or the defeat of a specific army.

Its goal was to assassinate one single individual.

At the time, the target of this mission was probably the most hated person in America,

with the exception of maybe Adolf Hitler.

His name was Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto.

Now, students of this time period will recognize that name immediately.

But if you aren't familiar,

Yamamoto was the man who planned the infamous sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. Over night, he

became a boogeyman for the United States, a figure on par with Osama bin Laden in the wake of

...