Zorro9 makes several comments
Quote:
Four items seem to stand out when you look at this intriguing B/W photograph:
1. The striking resemblance to Capt Fred J. Noonan & the findings of the H/C Image expert relating to his face features found in the original photo.
2. The back of a female Caucasian poss AE glancing at her aircraft nearby.
3. Something that looks like an aircraft on a barge near a Japanese ship originally misidentified by the H/C folks
4. The lack of Japanese guards in the area
To begin, there are comments online from at least two people who appear to have the book in their hands: Appears to be little question that the book was published in 1935, and thus cannot be AE and FN. However, the photo may well be from Jaluit Island.
My comments on those of Zorro9:
1&2. Frankly, the photos are fuzzy enough that I see no particular reason to think the two figures to be Caucasian, or the seated one to be female. I think the conclusions drawn by the History Channel are a lot of wishful thinking, and jumping to conclusions. ( HC is, I think, unlikely to recant on these conclusions; they have never second-guessed on any of the really silly ancient aliens and mermaids-are-real pieces they have presented. )
3. The "barge" behind the freighter includes some kind of aircraft-like appearance, but again the photo is fuzzy and this could just as easily be - and Occam's Razor would say this is more likely to be - the sails of another pleasure boat, of which there are others in the picture.
4. The lack of Japanese guards has been made by many. If AE and FN were truly captured and held as spies, they would have been heavily guarded, and likely kept well out of the sight of any civilians.
The entire captured-by-the-Japanese thesis has a serious flaw in that this makes the assumption that the Japanese would do this in 1937. But 1937 was a lot different than 1940/41. While American-Japanese relations were a bit strained, they were much better than later, and I think the Japanese would have jumped at the chance to gain all the goodwill associated with a rescue and return of AE and FN. Furthermore, there have been people who have studied this from the Japanese side, and studied this pretty hard and likely with hopes of finding AE, but find no evidence of such Japanese custody. Enough time has passed that if they were in Japanese custody, better evidence would likely have been found.
The eyewitness testimony from the Marshal Islands is all made decades after the event, and is quite inconsistent (there are, for example, a number of eye-witness burial sites for AE and FN). These reports were made to people who asked leading questions and sought specific answers. This is all a lot like the stories about the early aviation experimenter Gustave Whitehead in Connecticut - the testimony is made to people who are heavily biased, and is itself suspect. Memories play tricks over time, and people say all kinds of things to gain attention.
I will say again: the lack of any consistent or hard evidence after the last radio message from AE in flight and near Howland suggests that they are now in deep water near the location of that last message. I think Occam's Razor suggests that to be the most logical conclusion.