Tokkō e no rekuiemu (The Requiem for Kamikaze)
by Yukie Kudō
Chūōkōron Shinsha, 2001, 222 pages
After the end of World War II, the Japanese public scorned
kamikaze pilots and other tokkōtai (Special Attack Corps) members who had
carried out suicide attacks. However, since about 1990, many Japanese now once
again regard these tokkōtai members as heroes who gave their lives for their
country. This book depicts tokkōtai members as young men who loved their
families and country and who willingly gave their lives to defend their
homeland. The author's goal is to analyze the tokkōtai spirit and communicate it
to generations unfamiliar with war, since she believes the former young men in
the tokkōtai can provide lessons to present-day Japanese about making
contributions and doing one's duty for one's country.
The Requiem for Kamikaze [1] provides an easy-to-read
overview of tokkōtai operations carried out by both the Japanese Navy and Army
near the end of World War II. The book has clear organization, non-technical
writing, and well-documented sources. Although comparative sales figures are unavailable,
this book probably is one of the bestselling books on tokkōtai published since
2000. The book has had eight printings (as of July 2005), and bookstores at
Japanese tokkōtai-related museums still prominently display it for sale four
years after its initial publication. The book relies heavily on previously
published sources, but its strengths include the author's connecting historical
material to the present time and her describing her personal reactions and
feelings toward the material. However, the author includes almost no critical
evaluations of sources and tokkōtai operations, and instead she focuses on the
virtues of the young men in the tokkōtai. The stories and letters in the book
focus on kamikaze pilots, so this term rather than tokkōtai will be used below.
Yukie Kudō has worked since 1992 as a journalist who also
appears on television as a commentator for current affairs. The Requiem for
Kamikaze is her first book, but she has written several previous articles
for magazines and newspapers. Kudō effectively utilized her work and personal
experiences in researching and writing this book. She includes excerpts from
several personal interviews that she conducted with surviving kamikaze pilots
and other people who knew pilots who died in suicide attacks. Two chapters
include detailed observations of historical photos, which she believes can
reveal a person's true emotions based on her own work experience in the media.
Kudō studied in the U.S. for high school and in England for graduate school, and
in the book she relates kamikaze pilot stereotypes that she heard during this
time. She also describes how in 1996 she began to suffer from panic attacks and
how during this period the last letters written by kamikaze pilots brought clarity
to her own mind as she shed tears while reading them.
The first five chapters deal with the wartime history of
kamikaze pilots, and the last four chapters cover the postwar period with
emphasis on current (as of 2001) opinions toward kamikaze pilots. Chapter 1
gives a summarized history of special attack operations, including the
formation of the first kamikaze corps in the Philippines in October 1944. About
two thirds of the approximately 7,000 men who died in special (suicide) attacks
did so in aerial attacks, and the remainder died using a variety of weapons
such as kaiten (manned torpedoes) and explosive motorboats.
Chapters 2 and 4 discuss how kamikaze pilots felt and what
they experienced up to departure and during flight, respectively. Based on
examination of the kamikaze pilots' writings and photos, Kudō thinks they
personally experienced the beauty of life and the marvels and preciousness of
living (p. 36). Her description of a typical kamikaze pilot's flight and attack
uses easy-to-understand language with a minimum of technical terms, and she
explains in the Afterward that she put together this account based on
information provided by both wartime and current pilots.
In order to convey kamikaze pilots' beliefs and emotions,
Chapter 3 introduces a number of their last letters. The chapter's first
section includes letters written to a pilots' parents, brother, or sister, and
the next section has letters to a pilot's child or wife. Haruo Araki, married
only one month before his suicide attack on May 11, 1945, wrote the following
letter included in this section (pp. 75-6):
Shigeko,
Are you doing well?
One month has passed. The happy dream has vanished, and
tomorrow I make an attack on an enemy ship. I will cross the River Styx [2]
to the
next world along with some Americans.
Looking back, I have been very unkind to you. It has been my habit to treat
you unkindly and have regrets afterward. Please forgive me.
I feel as if my heart will break when I think of your long
life ahead. Please somehow be strong in spirit and be happy. After I am gone,
please take care of my father in place of me.
Living for an eternal noble cause
Protecting always our country from the despicable enemy
Haruo
Yūkyū [3] Hikōtai Commander
The final four sections of Chapter 3 include letters with
the following themes: thoughts about country and family, belief in the future,
spiritual anguish about life and death, and comparisons to falling cherry
blossoms.
Chapter 5 gives stories of people who saw kamikaze pilots
off, including a father who spent time together with his son and other kamikaze
corps members before their final mission, local high school girls who worked at
the Army air base in Chiran, and a woman named Tome Torihama who operated a
restaurant in Chiran frequented by many pilots. Chapter 6 discusses the feelings
of kamikaze pilots who survived the war. It includes the story of Tadamasa
Itatsu, who made a forced landing after his plane's engine developed problems
during a suicide mission. After the war's end, he visited numerous bereaved
families of kamikaze pilots. During these visits he collected many photographs
and letters that later became part of the collection of the Chiran Peace Museum
for Kamikaze Pilots, where Itatsu served as the first museum director. This
chapter also talks about the Tōkyō restaurant of Tome Torihama's daughter
Reiko, who met many kamikaze pilots in Chiran. After the war, surviving pilots
often visited Reiko's restaurant to talk together about their wartime
experiences.
Chapter 7 examines different ways kamikaze pilots have been
memorialized. For example, one Philippine man was deeply impressed by the
character of the kamikaze pilots he met in late 1944 when he was 14 years old.
He led efforts to erect a monument to kamikaze pilots at the former Mabalacat
Airfield, from where the first kamikaze planes made sorties. In another example, the
Chiran Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots displays in its lobby a large painting
(3 x 4.4 meters) that depicts six heavenly maidens helping a kamikaze pilot
escape from his burning plane. Shigeko Araki, the widow of the pilot who wrote
the letter translated above, saw the painting for the first time in 1987. As
her tears flowed when she viewed the painting, she felt that the agonies she
had endured for so long after the war's end had been lifted. Chapter 8 includes
various impressions and thoughts written by visitors to the Chiran Peace
Museum. This selection of writings illustrates how current Japanese people feel
after learning about the young men who carried out suicide attacks for their
country.
In the book's last chapter, Kudō tries to connect the
kamikaze pilots' actions and beliefs to modern-day Japanese society. She refers
to a national survey that has shown a consistent increase since 1969 in the
percentage of Japanese people who think emphasis should be placed on benefits
for individuals rather than the nation as a whole. In 1998, the survey showed
37% (down from 45% in 1991) thought national interests were most important, and
30% (up from 24% in 1991) thought individual interests should be emphasized.
Kudō argues that Japanese people are losing their national viewpoint, and she
gives a December 1999 example of two pilots of a military trainer that
developed engine trouble and crashed after hitting some high-voltage power
lines while trying to return to base. Kudō criticizes the Japanese media for
just covering the 800 thousand households that lost electricity in Tokyo and
Saitama as a result of the crash. She believes that the two pilots should been
treated as national heroes, since they chose to go down with their plane rather
than eject so they would avoid hitting a residential area. The author believes
that the two pilots would have been regarded as national heroes in the U.S. and
Britain, whereas Japan's media ignored the pilots while focusing on the
individual concerns of the power outage. In the same way as the two pilots of
the trainer, the kamikaze pilots gave up their lives for others in their
country. The chapter's final section discusses "duty, honor, and
country," which means that there is great honor and praise for carrying
out one's duty and making contributions for one's country. Kudō concludes that
the brave kamikaze pilots admirably embodied this concept of "duty, honor,
and country."
Although this book serves as an excellent introduction to
the complex subject of kamikaze pilots and other tokkōtai members, it does have
some weak points. First, the book frequently generalizes about kamikaze pilots
based on limited support. For instance, many examples in the book come from the
former Army air base at Chiran in southern Kyūshū, but only about 6% of the
total of about 7,000 tokkōtai members who died in the war made sorties from Chiran.
Second, consistent with the title of The Requiem for Kamikaze, the book
extols the virtues of kamikaze pilots, but it does not mention negative stories
about the pilots. Third, the author quickly concludes the kamikaze pilots'
letters represented their true feeling since many letters escaped the usual
military censorship by being sent through their military comrades or
non-military personnel (p. 65). Although some letters surely escaped
censorship, military censors probably reviewed most last letters since it was
expected that pilots write something to their families prior to their final
missions. Also, pilots faced intense pressure from superiors and peers to
support suicide attacks, and this may partly account for why so many pilots
wrote such positive expressions to support dying for their country without
question. As a final weakness, the book lacks photos, even though the author
carefully evaluates a number of kamikaze pilot photos taken both prior to takeoff and during
the moments of final attack.
For readers wanting an introduction to kamikaze pilots
and other tokkōtai members from the Japanese perspective, The Requiem for
Kamikaze is one of the best books available. The book's clear focus,
organization, and writing allow readers to understand something of the
character of the kamikaze pilots and how their commitment to country may have
applicability to today's Japan. Although the author states that her purpose is
not to romanticize the war and kamikaze attacks, the book clearly avoids
criticism of the kamikaze pilots and focuses on their commitment to "duty,
honor, and country."
Notes
1. Yukie Kudō's web site translates the Japanese
title as The Requiem for Kamikaze, so this translation has been used for
this book review. However, the Japanese title uses the word tokkō
(literally "special attacks"), which includes both kamikaze and other
special attack corps that carried out suicide attacks near the end of World War
II. A more literal translation of the title might be Requiem for Special
Attack Forces.
2. The letter has the term "Sanzu
River," which is the Japanese Buddhist equivalent of the River Styx.
3. Yūkyū means "eternal." The poem that
ends his letter starts with yūkyū.
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