Battle of Los Angeles

Battle of Los Angeles
	Part of the American Theater of World War II
	; Photos from Los Angeles Times, 26 February 1942
Date	24–25 February 1942
Location	Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Casualties and losses
	5 civilians died 3 died in car accident; 2 died of heart attack;

The Battle of Los Angeles, also known as the Great Los Angeles Air Raid, is the name given by contemporary sources to a rumored attack on the continental United States by Imperial Japan and the subsequent anti-aircraft artillery barrage which took place from late 24 February to early 25 February 1942, over Los Angeles, California.^[1]^[2]^[3] The incident occurred less than three months after the U.S. entered World War II in response to the Imperial Japanese Navy's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, and one day after the bombardment of Ellwood near Santa Barbara on 23 February. Initially, the target of the aerial barrage was thought to be an attacking force from Japan, but speaking at a press conference shortly afterward, Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox called the purported attack a "false alarm". Newspapers of the time published a number of reports and speculations of a cover-up to conceal an actual invasion by enemy airplanes.

When documenting the incident in 1949, the United States Coast Artillery Association identified a meteorological balloon sent aloft at 1:00 am as having "started all the shooting" and concluded that "once the firing started, imagination created all kinds of targets in the sky and everyone joined in".^[4] In 1983, the U.S. Office of Air Force History attributed the event to a case of "war nerves" triggered by a lost weather balloon and exacerbated by stray flares and shell bursts from adjoining batteries. As an example of incompetence, the incident was derisively referred to as the "Battle of Los Angeles" or the "Great Los Angeles Air Raid".^[5]

^ "The Battle of Los Angeles". Military Museum. Retrieved 6 November 2015.
^ Caughey, John; Caughey, LaRee (1977). Los Angeles: biography of a city. University of California Press. p. 364. ISBN 978-0-520-03410-5. great los angeles air raid.
^ Farley, John E. (1998). Earthquake fears, predictions, and preparations in mid-America. Southern Illinois University Press. ISBN 978-0-8093-2201-5. Retrieved 17 May 2010.
^ Murphy, Col. John G. (May–June 1949). "Activities of The Ninth Army AAA – L.A. 'Attacked'" (PDF). Antiaircraft Journal, the United States Coast Artillery Association. LXXXII (3): 5. Archived from the original (PDF) on 12 November 2020. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
^ Cite error: The named reference Lotchin was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

[1] "The Battle of Los Angeles". Military Museum. Retrieved 6 November 2015.

[Caughy-2] Caughey, John; Caughey, LaRee (1977). Los Angeles: biography of a city. University of California Press. p. 364. ISBN 978-0-520-03410-5. great los angeles air raid.

[Farley-3] Farley, John E. (1998). Earthquake fears, predictions, and preparations in mid-America. Southern Illinois University Press. ISBN 978-0-8093-2201-5. Retrieved 17 May 2010.

[AA-4] Murphy, Col. John G. (May–June 1949). "Activities of The Ninth Army AAA – L.A. 'Attacked'" (PDF). Antiaircraft Journal, the United States Coast Artillery Association. LXXXII (3): 5. Archived from the original (PDF) on 12 November 2020. Retrieved 3 March 2016.

[Lotchin-5] Cite error: The named reference Lotchin was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

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