And if he took credit for the victory of 1941, how could he not shoulder blame for the defeat of 1943? To duck it would make him into a liar, and he refused to lie to himself. He intended to atone in his own person for his plan’s failure. He thought Yamamoto would understand.
He had an Arisaka some soldier or naval landing force man would never need again. He wished he had a uniform that gave better camouflage than his Navy whites. By now, the whites had so many dirt and grass stains, they hid him better than they had a couple of days earlier. He wasn’t the only man in whites to form a part of the Japanese skirmish line. That made him feel better. He wasn’t the only officer determined to make the Yankees pay for everything they got.
The enemy skirmish line was a couple of hundred meters away. The Americans weren’t pushing forward right this minute. Every so often, they would fire a few rifle shots or a burst from a machine gun or a Browning Automatic Rifle to discourage the Japanese from attacking. The men on Genda’s side would do the same.
Genda didn’t think his countrymen could attack. They were a motley mix of Army and Navy men. An Army captain seemed to be in local command. Genda outranked him, but didn’t try to throw his weight around. The Army officer sounded capable, while he himself knew as much about infantry combat as he did about Paris fashions. He was learning fast, though.
As for the Americans… By all the signs, they were waiting till they built up overwhelming force. Then they would hit the Japanese line somewhere and pour through. The defenders would have the choice of dying where they stood or falling back to try to stop the enemy somewhere else. Genda had already seen the Yankees do that once. They didn’t take many chances. If he’d enjoyed all their materiel, he wouldn’t have taken many chances, either.
A senior private squatted in the foxhole along with Genda. He was filthy and weary, but managed a smile of sorts when he noticed Genda’s eye on him. “Hard work, sir,” he said wryly.
“Hai.” Genda nodded. In a mess like this, he worried less about rank than he would have otherwise. He said, “You look like you’ve done your share of hard work and then some.”
“Could be, sir,” the soldier answered. “I started up at the north coast-and here I am.”
That was something unusual. Most Japanese soldiers who’d met the Americans on the invasion beaches were dead. Genda knew the Army preferred dying in place to retreating. Keeping his voice carefully neutral, he said, “You must have seen a lot of fighting. How did that happen, Senior Private, ah…?”
“My name is Furusawa, sir.” The soldier showed no reluctance to give it. He didn’t seem to feel he’d done anything wrong. And he explained why: “I found all my superiors killed around me. That left me free to use my own judgment. I thought I would be more use to the Emperor killing as many Americans as I could than throwing my life away to no good purpose.” By the way he eyed Genda, anyone who presumed to disagree with him would be sorry.
But Genda didn’t disagree. “And have you done that?” he asked.
“Sir, I have,” the soldier answered. His rifle-an American Springfield-had plainly seen a lot of use, but it was clean and in good condition. Seeing Genda’s glance toward the weapon, Furusawa went on, “My unit’s barracks in Honolulu were bombed, and we lost our Arisakas.”
“How do you like the American piece?” Genda asked.
“It’s a little heavy, sir, but not too bad,” Furusawa said. “And it fires a larger-caliber round than an Arisaka, so it’s got more stopping power. I do like that.”
Like the rest of what Senior Private Furusawa had to say, that was more clearly reasoned than Genda would have looked for from a lowly enlisted man. And, while Furusawa’s accent said he came from somewhere in the south-down by Hiroshima, perhaps-he also sounded better educated than the farmers and fishermen who made up a large part of the population there.
“Why are you only a senior private?” Genda asked, by which he meant, Why do you talk the way you do? Why do you think the way you do?
The younger man understood what he didn’t say, which showed Furusawa did think that way. With a crooked smile, he replied, “Well, sir, for one thing, I was a pretty new conscript when we came here, and there weren’t a lot of promotions after that. And my father is a druggist. That sort of made me a white crow to a lot of the country boys in my regiment.” He echoed Genda’s thought there, and continued, “Complaining wouldn’t have done me much good. And keeping me down made some sense, too, because the others might not have followed me the way they would have with someone else.”
Genda wondered if he himself could have spoken so dispassionately about being passed over for a promotion he obviously deserved. He doubted it. “What do you think will happen now?” he asked.
“That depends, sir. You’d know better than I do-has the Navy got enough ships and planes to beat the Americans and drive them away?”
“No.” Genda spoke without hesitation.
Senior Private Furusawa shrugged. He didn’t seem very surprised. “Well, in that case we’ll just have to give it our best shot, won’t we?” He shrugged again. “Karma, neh?”
He could speak indirectly at least as well as Genda. What he meant was, We’re all going to die here, and we can’t do a damn thing about it. Genda thought about that, but not for long. He didn’t need long. He sighed, nodded, and said, “Hai.”
YASUO FURUSAWA KNEW HE OUGHT TO GET AWAY from Commander Genda. The naval officer knew he’d fallen back from the north instead of senselessly charging and throwing his life away. That made Genda dangerous to him as the Japanese were driven back into Honolulu. If the officer wanted to make an example of someone, he had a nice, juicy target. And sticking around Genda endangered Furusawa in another way, too. The Navy man was a greenhorn at infantry combat. His white uniform only made things worse. He drew bullets as well as he could have without painting a target on his chest. And bullets meant for him could all too easily find someone nearby instead.
But Furusawa stayed by him. Before long, he found himself Genda’s unofficial aide and orderly. Genda, he thought, was the smartest man he’d ever met. And the officer didn’t seem to think he was a baka yaro himself. That made Furusawa proud. Right now, pride was about all any Japanese had left.
He shook his head. Japanese soldiers, or most of them, had a contempt for death the Americans couldn’t begin to match. Oh, the Yankees were brave enough. He’d seen that in the first invasion, and he saw it again now. But he could not imagine an American rushing out against a tank with a flaming bottle of gasoline and smashing it down on the cooling louvers above the engine. The Japanese who did that must have known he couldn’t get back to cover alive. And he didn’t; the Americans shot him before he made even three steps. But their snorting mechanical monster went up in flames, and the Japanese picked off the crewmen bailing out. Without the tank, the enemy attack bogged down.
Could I do that? Furusawa wondered. His long retreat from the north left him with doubts about himself and about his courage. He didn’t think he was afraid to die if his death meant something. The death of that soldier with the Molotov cocktail certainly had. He’d cost the Americans a tank and five men.
That was one side of the coin. The other side was, losing that tank and those five men wouldn’t cost the USA the battle. Honolulu would fall. Hawaii would go back under the Stars and Stripes. Nobody but a blind man could believe anything else.
Well, in that case, why don’t we throw down our rifles and throw up our hands and surrender? But Furusawa shook his head. No less than any other Japanese, he believed surrender the ultimate disgrace. And he didn’t want to spread his own disgrace and shame to his family back in the home islands.