“To be sure, journalists erred before the war. But that ceased to be the case after the war. We rectified that crazed patriotism,” Takayama said, his pride evident.
Mrs. Takeda once again placed a gentling hand on her husband’s arm. He looked at her and gave a small nod. When he spoke again, his voice was just above a whisper.
“Most of the newspapers after the war argued that the citizenry must cast off their patriotism, even going as far as to suggest that loving one’s country was a crime. While that might appear on first glance to be the exact opposite of what the media supported before the war, their attitude that they knew what was just and that they had to educate the witless masses was the same. And what was the result? No other nation has produced as many sell-out politicians and intellectuals who disdain their own country just to curry favor with our neighbors.”
He faced Takayama head-on and said in a clear voice, “I won’t ask about your political views, but I insist you stop discussing the kamikaze pilots from some inane ideological viewpoint. If you’re incapable of reading between the lines to glean the intended meaning of words written by men who were prepared for death and who did their utmost to express their love for the families and the country they were about to leave behind, then I cannot call you a journalist.”
In response, Takayama crossed his arms and arched back, unfazed. “No matter how much you try and gloss it over, most kamikazes were terrorists.”
Takeda stared fixedly at him. Then he said very quietly, “People like you are just all words and no action. Get out of my sight.”
“Understood. I’ll be taking my leave.” Takayama stood up, a glum look on his face. Keiko looked lost for a moment but immediately got up and followed him.
“Aren’t you going to leave, too?” Takeda asked me.
“My grandfather died a kamikaze, sir.”
“Ah, that’s right. You’re Miyabe-san’s grandson.”
“Yes, sir. But I don’t know anything about how he died. He didn’t leave a will or anything. Listening to you, sir, I feel like I get at least some of the suffering that he endured.”
Takeda slowly shook his head. “Only kamikaze pilots really understood their own suffering. There was a world of difference, a massive chasm, between us in the reserve pool and those who were selected.”
Just then, Keiko came back to join us. “Takayama-san has left. Will you allow me to stay and listen to your story, sir?”
“I don’t mind, so long as you intend to actually hear me out with an open mind.”
“Yes, I indeed do, sir,” Keiko replied.
Takeda nodded. “Let’s change the scene,” he said, standing.
A few minutes later we were inside Takeda’s room. It was my first time inside a top-class hotel suite. Mrs. Takeda poured us green tea from a set in the room. It was very good tea. Takeda sipped at his in silence, clearly attempting to calm his agitated heart. We drank ours quietly.
After a while Takeda spoke. “Before I talk about Miyabe-san, there’s something else I need to tell you.”
After the war, kamikaze pilots were both praised and censured. While sometimes they were extolled as heroes who sacrificed their lives for the country, at other times they were reviled as warped, fanatical nationalists.
Neither was accurate. The kamikaze pilots were neither heroes nor madmen. They accepted their inescapable fate, and struggled to turn their all-too-brief lives into something meaningful. I observed them close at hand. They thought of their families, and about their country. They weren’t fools. And they knew the plan to use kamikazes was hopeless in turning the tide of the war.
They weren’t like the fanatical young officers of the February 26 Incident. They weren’t drunk on the heroism of dying a glorious death. Some may have adopted that sort of mindset in order to accept their fate. But even if there had been such pilots, who could blame them? They were faced with the very difficult-to-digest fact that they were about to die. So what if they dressed up in some bravado in an attempt to come to terms with their death and to seek refuge from their fears?
There wasn’t a single pilot, not one, who went to pieces upon learning that he had been selected to become a kamikaze. Of course, none of them cried or made a fuss before they left on their missions, either. In fact, many of them smiled before climbing into the cockpit. They weren’t just putting up a brave front. Their hearts had become free and clear.
I’ve heard that many death-row inmates scream and cry on the day of their execution. Some even can’t stand or walk on their own, and the guards have to practically drag them to the execution chamber. Even though they’re being punished for their own heinous deeds, they’re miserably incapable of accepting their fate.
Among those who stand opposed to the death penalty are some who say that the psychological terror is cruel. That’s probably accurate. I think it’s unimaginably terrifying to be told, “We’re going to kill you,” and then spend the rest of your life wondering when the day will come. That morning, when the door opens and they come for you, you know it’s your time to die. If they don’t come, then you’ve been allowed to see another day, which only prolongs the fear. Until the day comes, the torture continues. It’s the pain of purgatory.
It was similar for those pilots the moment they were selected from the pool of reserves to become kamikazes. If their name was listed on the blackboard in the morning, then their time had come. If their name wasn’t listed, they had been given another day to live. They didn’t know when that day would come. The day their name was listed, their lives were over. They wouldn’t see their loved ones ever again, and they would never be able to do the things they wanted to do with their lives. Their future was to be broken off in just a few hours’ time. How terrifying that must have been for them. No matter how hard I try to imagine it, I’m sure the reality was far more horrible.
And yet they calmly accepted it. I saw off many a friend who gave me a smile before departing. How much internal conflict did they have to overcome to get to such a place? If you can’t imagine it, you aren’t qualified to discuss those men. That’s why I said that the kamikazes and the reserve pool pilots were totally different.
It goes without saying that even those of us in the reserve pool felt like we were going to die. We had resolved to go in a manly way when our names came up. But I think there was a big difference between those actually placed in those circumstances and those yet to be chosen.
There wasn’t a single man among us who wanted to give his life for the Emperor.
After the war, many intellectuals wrote that before the war most Japanese revered the Emperor as a living god. What garbage. No one did. Even the young officers who had seized the reins of the military didn’t believe anything of the sort.
I’m repeating myself here, but the ones responsible for turning Japan into that kind of country were the journalists.
Before the war, the newspapers would simply print verbatim the announcements from Imperial General HQ, writing article after article of propaganda. And after the war when the American GHQ took over the country, the newspapers followed GHQ’s orders and ran articles heralding democracy and decrying prewar Japan as a country of unenlightened fools. They wrote as though the entire population was ignorant and below them. The journalists believed themselves to be the arbiters of justice, and their condescension towards the masses makes me sick to my stomach.
Sorry, I wandered off topic.
It’s useless to complain about such things at this point in time. But listening to that reporter just now reminded me of a typical commissioned officer in the military back then. The type that places blind faith in their organization, never attempting to think for themselves, always believing their actions to be correct, paying absolute loyalty to the organization they serve.