I don’t know what happened between them. But Keiko, who’d been in college at the time, had a crush on Fujiki that was more like a younger girl’s.
The nursing home was in the suburbs of Okayama City, in an area lush with greenery right against the mountains. The building was an all-white modern construction, and at first I mistook it for a condominium complex. According to Keiko, who had done some research online, the nursing home charged tens of millions of yen on admittance but then took care of each resident until death.
We went to the office, told them we wanted to see Tanigawa-san, and were shown into a reception space that resembled a small conference room, with a large desk in the center.
After a while, a caretaker appeared pushing an old man in a wheelchair.
“I’m Tanigawa. You’ll have to forgive me for staying seated,” the old man said.
My sister and I introduced ourselves too.
“It’s been years since I’ve had visitors,” he said with a laugh.
The caretaker served us tea. Tanigawa held his teacup tenderly and quietly sipped at the tea.
“I’ve hardly ever discussed the war with anyone. I’d hate for people to think I was bragging, and I brook no pity or sympathy. Above all, I can’t stand answering questions just to satisfy someone’s idle curiosity. I’m sure many others who fought in that war feel the same way.”
Keiko tried to say something, but Tanigawa motioned for her to be still.
“I know what you’re going to say. Perhaps these stories should be passed on. Perhaps that is the duty of those of us who fought in the war. I think those who choose to talk about their wartime experiences are digging up a lot of painful things out of a sense of obligation.”
He placed his teacup on the table. “I don’t have a lot of time left. I’ve given much thought to it since my wife passed away, but I still don’t know the answer. Perhaps my time will be up before I ever figure this out.” Tanigawa looked me in the eye. “But today, I’ll tell.”
I fought alongside Miyabe as part of the 12th Air Fleet, based in Shanghai, China. He was an incredibly courageous and fearless fighter pilot. His skills in the cockpit were outstanding, and he was extraordinarily good at dogfighting. Once he locked on to an enemy aircraft, he never let go. One of the guys said, “That Miyabe’s just like a snapping turtle.”
Back then in Shanghai we had loads of masters in our ranks, like Sadaaki Akamatsu, Toshio Kuroiwa, and Kanichi Kashimura. Tetsuzo Iwamoto was also there, but compared to the others he was still wet behind the ears.
I got beaten up by Akamatsu-san fairly often. He was a force of nature born back in the Meiji era, and drinking made him wild. He had so many counts of alcohol-induced violence that he had his good-conduct badge taken away. Akamatsu-san continued to cause trouble even after the war and has a bad reputation, but he was a truly masterful pilot. He claimed 350 kills, which was actually a big fat lie, but his aerial combat skills were the real deal.
Kuroiwa-san was adept at one-on-one dogfights and famously handled a young Saburo Sakai like a child during a mock dogfight. He was discharged before the Pacific War and became a pilot at a private airline, but took on cargo transport duty during the war and died off the coast of the Malay Peninsula in 1944. Had he been flying a fighter instead, I’m sure he wouldn’t have gotten shot down.
Kashimura-san was famous for making a return trip on just one wing, believe it or not. In an air battle over Nanchang, he lost one of the wings of his Type 96 carrier-based fighter, yet still managed to dexterously pilot the plane back to base. The newspapers published articles about his feat, and he became the most renowned naval pilot in the nation prior to World War II. His air combat skills were also exemplary, of course. I had him as an opponent in many mock dogfights, but I was no match. Yet, Kashimura-san, too, died in combat at Guadalcanal in 1943.
Even among such incredible pilots, Miyabe could hold his own. Even Akamatsu-san admitted, “He just might be a genius.” At the same time, Kuroiwa-san once told him, “Stop being so reckless, or you’ll be a goner no matter how many lives you have.”
I was neither on particularly good or bad terms with Miyabe. We were the same age and joined the Navy around the same time, but Miyabe had become a trainee pilot before me, so he had more experience in the cockpit. Since he was obviously more skilled as well, there wasn’t any sense of rivalry between us. But if you’ll allow me to boast about one thing, before the Pacific War began, the overall skill level of us pilot trainees was very high. In my year, only fifty candidates out of eight thousand were accepted, and just over twenty made it to the end and became carrier pilots. We’re talking about a 1 in 400 ratio. We were the chosen few, if I do say so myself.
In the spring of 1941, Miyabe and I were recalled to the interior and joined the crew of aircraft carriers. I was assigned to the Soryu and he to the Akagi, so although we were part of the same fleet and participated in the same operations for six months starting with Pearl Harbor, we never met during that time.
We ran riot, though. We were undefeated everywhere we went. That probably hurt us in the end. The higher-ups took to believing that we’d never lose no matter what.
Even so, we pilots never let down our guard. Why? Because we were always on the front lines of the conflict. While the Mobile Force enjoyed consecutive victories, it was impossible for us not to lose any pilots in the process. No matter how overwhelming the victory, there were always some planes that never made it back. We lost twenty-nine planes even at Pearl Harbor. So we always fought with everything we had. It was our own lives that would end if we got careless in the skies.
At Midway too, our Zero fighters shot down over a hundred enemy land- and carrier-based aircraft. Our losing that battle is on Nagumo, and also Genda.
After Midway, we aviators were summoned back to the interior and quarantined for about a month. We were issued a gag order about the four sunken aircraft carriers. There was a sense that if we dared to say anything, we would be court-martialed. It was so absurd. Why keep the truth from the people? What’s worse, apparently the Navy didn’t even tell the Army the full truth. I’ve heard the Army was just baffled that the Navy couldn’t wrest control of the seas and skies despite being at an advantage, supposedly, against the Americans.
After that, I was assigned to a newly formed carrier air group. Most of the pilots not boarding a carrier were ordered to Rabaul.
I was part of the crew of the converted aircraft carrier Hiyo and participated in the Guadalcanal Campaign. We also fought in the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands, which pushed us to the limit. We managed to sink the USS Hornet after several waves of attacks, but we lost a great number of battle-tested aviators, distinguished bomber aircrew in particular.
In the end, we failed to recapture Guadalcanal. During the half-year-long conflict, the majority of those who had survived Midway perished in the skies above the Solomon Islands. I think we lost about eighty percent of our most seasoned pilots there. It was an irrevocable blunder on the part of the Imperial Navy.
After six months working as a flight instructor in the interior, I was transferred to Kupang Base on Timor in Indonesia. From there, we repeatedly attacked Port Darwin, Australia.