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Kazue Eguchi
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Human Bomb Corps: 160 Men Annihilated in First Battle (Ningen bakudan butai:
Uijin de 160jin zenmetsu)
Researched and written by Shūji Fukano and Fusako Kadota
Pages 102-104 of Tokkō kono chi yori: Kagoshima shutsugeki no kiroku
(Special attacks from this land: Record of Kagoshima sorties)
Minaminippon Shinbunsha, 2016
At about 11 a.m. on March 21, 1945, Kazue Eguchi (87 years old, resident in
northern part of Kimotsuki-chō), who was a third-year student at Kanoya Junior
High School under the old education system, was eating with his younger brother
at a restaurant in Kitada-chō in Kanoya City as they waited for a bus that would
go toward their home in Uchinoura.
Suddenly a deafening roar sounded from Kanoya Naval Air Base. When they
rushed outside, all of the people going along the road were looking up at the
clear skies. Twin-engine Type 1 Land-based Attack Bombers (Allied
code name of Betty) were taking off one after another from the base.
Suspended from the belly of each Type 1 Land-based Attack Bomber was a
light-blue plane with small wings. For some reason I had a feeling that it
seemed like
tragic heroism. The formation circled several times in the skies above the base
and flew off in the direction of Shibushi Bay.
Kanoya was tense after suffering its first aerial bombings by the American
task force three days earlier on the 18th. "Was that the human bomb that had been
rumored about?" Eguchi had an uneasy feeling. He wondered whether persons
around him felt the same way. He remembers that they quietly saw off the
squadron.
The scene of aircraft take-offs was the first campaign for what was called
the Jinrai Butai (Thunder Gods Corps), which was the aerial special (suicide)
attack specialty unit (721st Naval Air Group) led by Colonel Motoharu Okamura.
As Eguchi had suspected, the small-size plane was a single-seat ōka
special attack aircraft.
The Navy developed the ōka as a special attack weapon for a
sure-sinking with one hit. It was loaded with a large-size warhead of 1.2 tons
that was 1.5 times that of a normal attack aircraft. It had rocket engines as
its propulsion mechanism that allowed it to realize a speed to break away from
American high-performance fighters, but its flying range of 60 kilometers was
extremely short. Therefore, the Type 1 Land-based Attack Bomber mother plane
carried it to the combat zone. After detachment near enemy ships, the ōka
crewmember piloted it to make a taiatari (body-crashing) attack where he also
lost his life.
After detachment of the ōka, the Type 1 Land-based Attack Bomber
was to return to base and make another sortie loaded with an ōka.
However, there was hardly any defensive capability against machine gun fire on
its fuselage, so enough escort fighters were needed when there was an ōka
attack in order to prevent enemy fighters from coming near.
Only remaining authentic ōka in Japan. Located at Japan
Air Self-Defense Force (JASDF) Iruma Base Shūbudai
Memorial Hall. Part of wings made of wood.
(Sayama City, Saitama Prefecture)
However, the first campaign for the ōka with the goal of
attacking American aircraft carriers that had drawn near the mainland did not go
according to military assumptions. Originally it was planned that another unit
of the Jinrai Butai would make a sortie on March 18 from Usa Air Base in Ōita
Prefecture, but the sortie was cancelled when shortly before the base suffered a
surprise attack from American aircraft. Fighters that had been prepared to
escort the Type 1 Land-based Attack Bombers were flushed out to intercept
American fighters, and many Usa Air Base fighters were lost.
Even so, the Fifth Air Fleet (Commander, Vice Admiral Matome Ugaki), which
had command of the Jinrai Butai, concluded that counterattacks until the day
prior to March 21 had resulted in heavy damage to the American task force. Even
while sufficient escort fighters were not ensured, the go sign was issued for a
sortie from Kanoya.
This estimate was overoptimistic. The 18 Type 1 Land-based Attack Bombers, 15
equipped with ōka weapons and 3 command aircraft, were completely
destroyed over the Pacific Ocean when they met numerous American fighters
waiting in ambush. One Type 1 Land-based Attack Bomber had a crew of 8 men
including the ōka pilot. All at once 160 men including escort
aircraft crewmen in the Jinrai Butai died in battle.
There is color footage of the Type 1 Land-based Attack Bomber squadron that
was taken by a camera synchronized with machine gun fire from an American
fighter. It is displayed even on the video submission site YouTube.
Images of the 30 or so Zero escort fighters are not in the footage, and
the Land-based Attack Bomber squadron aircraft were shot down.
The Ministry of the Navy did not make a public announcement about the
existence of the Jinrai Butai until May 28, more than two months after the first
sortie. In newspapers dated the following day on May 29, it was widely reported
that 332 men had died in battle through April 14. However, there was nothing at
all about the tragedy of the first campaign when over half the reported total
died in battle.
While Eguchi had some feelings of tragic heroism, he did not find out the
truth about the tragic end of the squadron that had made a sortie until after
the war.
Kagoshima Nippō (now Minami Nippon Shimbun)
dated May 29, 1945, when existence of
Jinrai
Butai was made known to public for first time
Related Web Pages
Translated by Bill Gordon
May 2025
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