a similar idea was employed during the doolittle raid, which occurred in the early stages of the pacific war of world war ii, where lieutenant colonel jimmy doolittle led a squadron of b-25 mitchells to bomb tokyo. the early model b-25b lacked any protective guns installed in the tail section, leaving them vulnerable to attacks from the rear. while modifying the bombers for the mission at eglin field, florida, doolittle had fake machine guns consisting of a pair of broomsticks painted black mounted at the tail end of the fuselage to simulate tail guns.