The World War II Chronicles

by William Craig

  The Americans wanted the exact location of all submarines, especially those carrying the deadly kaiten, the human torpedo, underwater counterpart to the kamikaze. Japanese naval personnel marked their positions at various bases on the coast of the Home Islands. Sutherland wanted assurance that none were presently on the high seas. He got it.

  Every Japanese army division was pinpointed on large-scale maps. Every naval ship was marked for the enemy to locate.

  As the hours went by, some stiffness went out of the meeting. Coca-Cola was served and cigarettes were passed out to the grateful Japanese. Smiles became more frequent as the American officers guided the emissaries from Tokyo through the emotion-ridden task of betraying their country’s defenses. Admiral Forrest Sherman was particularly kind to his guests, who relaxed under his pleasant manner.

  By four o’clock in the morning, it was done. The Japanese had handed over all their precious data to the foe.

  General Sutherland made a concluding statement: “The Japanese side has furnished all the necessary information on the occupation. It is very eager to have peaceful occupation without any trouble. The United States side has the same desire but wants an early accomplishment of the occupation in agreement with the terms of the Potsdam Declaration. We do not want any wasted time. Therefore, we will make the landing date August twenty-eighth.” Sutherland had conceded five days of grace to the Japanese to let them get things under control.

  Kawabe was still not satisfied: “It is impossible to prepare within that time. At least ten days will be necessary. We do not want any trouble in the occupation.” When Sutherland was adamant, Kawabe realized the futility of his own position. He offered one last comment: “You are the winners and so your decision is almighty, but to our way of thinking, there remains some uneasiness.” The meeting ended on that note.

  In the predawn darkness, the Japanese were whisked back to the Rosario Apartments where they had a prolonged discussion of the American demands. One thing was apparent. Someone should fly back to Tokyo immediately and alert authorities to the fact that Americans would be landing much sooner than expected. It was decided first to send a telegram to the Foreign Office and ask its advice.

  While the wire was being sent to Tokyo, various documents presented by the Americans were examined. One of them was rather unusual and sent the blood pressures of the delegation soaring. It was a directive spelling out privileges to be accorded Occupation officers. Listed very carefully was the number of maids to be allotted to various ranks. Generals got three, colonels, majors, captains and commanders two, and the lowly lieutenant only one. In the midst of discussions about Japanese armaments, installations and other vital defense questions, the maid issue sparked a spontaneous protest in the delegation. Tempers flared as the tired, nervous Japanese raged at the offensive request. On the alert for some sign of American haughtiness, they found it in the maid issue.

  Curiously, when the delegation left for Japan later that day, the maid-quota document was not in their baggage. It had been removed from the list of instructions they carried. Possibly the Americans had somehow learned of the objections Kawabe’s group voiced in their private discussions.

  After four hours of sleep, the Japanese were ushered to a breakfast of bacon and eggs and then taken to the City Hall for a last briefing. The August 28 deadline stayed as it was. Kawabe did not bother to argue any more.

  Just before adjournment, General Sutherland handed Kawabe the draft of a surrender proclamation to be issued in the name of the Emperor. Prepared in Washington, it was now read aloud by an interpreter. Almost immediately members of the Japanese delegation tensed visibly. Kawabe’s chin even began to quiver.

  To some Americans in the room who were familiar with the Japanese language, the reason was obvious. In the Proclamation, pronouns normally used in connection with the Emperor’s name had been omitted in favor of more common, less dignified terms. To the Kawabe group, the document was an insult to the Throne and the personage of Hirohito.

  When the reading was over, Kawabe expressed his anxiety by slamming his hand down on the table. The meeting ended on this somber note.

  Before boarding the plane for the return trip, Kawabe and Foreign Office official Okazaki accepted an invitation to a brief rendezvous with General Willoughby at the Rosario Apartments. There the Americans retrieved an awkward situation.

  Aware that the original surrender proclamation contained serious errors, the Allied Translator and Interpreter Section in Manila had hurriedly drafted a new version containing appropriate Imperial references. This document was handed to Kawabe by Colonel Sidney Mashbir, who apologized on behalf of General Willoughby and told the Japanese to disregard the proclamation first given them at City Hall.

  The Japanese were astounded and delighted at the switch in documents. On the way to the airport, they expressed their gratitude repeatedly. In this atmosphere of good will, goodbyes and salutes were exchanged at Nichols Field. At 1:00 P.M. the transport rose into a rain-filled sky and headed north to Ie.

  Within nineteen hours the emissaries of two warring powers had met and discussed the pending occupation of a sovereign nation. The conqueror had been courteous, the losers on the whole impressed with the forebearance and general behavior of the victors. A good beginning had been made.

  The flight to Ie was over four hours long. When the Japanese landed this time, there was no crowd to gaze at them. The two Japanese Bettys were there waiting for the delegation. However, one of them was found to have mechanical trouble, necessitating an overnight stay for eight members of the mission. Kawabe and seven others quickly took off in the other plane for the last leg of their arduous trip.

  The eight delegates left on Ie prepared to spend a night in the enemy camp. They went to chow, and G.I.’s standing in line smiled at them and generally made them feel comfortable. Off in the distance, Colonel Matsuda noticed a battlefield graveyard, where Americans walked through rows of white crosses stretching for acres. Some knelt at markers and bowed their heads. The Japanese officer watched and was watched in turn as he stared at the field of dead men.

  To the northeast, near the Japanese shore, the bomber carrying Kawabe to Tokyo labored on into the night. When the pilot looked at his instrument panel, he was shocked to discover the gas gauge was nearly empty. Checking it out, he found that a fuel line had sprung a serious leak. He confided his news to two naval officers, Captains Terai and Ohmae, who chose not to alarm Kawabe. As the eight men sat in the rear of the aircraft the pilot changed course to bring the ship closer to the coastline of Japan in case the fuel supply dwindled too quickly and necessitated a forced landing.

  At eleven o’clock, the pilot told Kawabe that the fuel leak would force him to make an emergency landing somewhere on the coastline of Honshu several hundred miles from Tokyo. Though there was bright moonlight, the ocean below was dark and forbidding. The prospect of ditching was not pleasant.

  The delegation’s chief concern, however, was for the surrender documents. Kawabe wondered what the Americans might think if they were lost or destroyed. After consultation, the only possible expedient was suggested.

  “Okazaki, are you still a good swimmer?” Katsuo Okazaki, the Foreign Office delegate, had been a champion swimmer, competing in 1924 in the Olympics in Paris. Now in his forties, he was being asked to guard the papers with his skill and his life. Recovering from his surprise at the question, he took them and tucked them inside his shirt.

  As the plane bored in toward the coast, the pilot saw the outlines of a beach. He brought the Betty down low over the water till it was just skimming the waves. When it touched the crests, the passengers were tossed wildly about. The pilot gunned the engines and lifted the bomber slightly. It went a short distance, then settled in the water just a few yards from a smooth beach.

  The top turret was flung open and the delegation tumbled out into knee-deep water. Only one man was hurt. It was Okazaki, the swimmer. He had smashed his head against the fuselage as the plan
e hit the surf, and lay dazed and bleeding until the others pulled him to safety.

  The survivors assembled on the white beach under the brilliant summer moon. Off to the northeast, the sacred mountain Fuji stood out clearly. Stunned, soaking wet, and unable to determine their exact location, the delegates stayed on the beach forty-five minutes waiting for help to find them. Finally they moved on. A few people they saw in the vicinity only fled when hailed. Finally two fishermen stopped to listen, and guided them down a road toward a village. Police were called and a truck came to pick them up. The tired travelers were taken to an airbase where they slept fitfully for a few hours, then took off early in the morning in another antiquated plane.

  In Tokyo the entire cabinet of Premier Higashi-Kuni waited in a state of extreme agitation. Knowing nothing of the forced landing, they had no idea of Kawabe’s fate. When the general appeared, Higashi-Kuni embraced him and offered him the thanks of the country. Kawabe was too exhausted to appreciate the honor. He only knew that his distasteful job was finished.

  EIGHTEEN

  Violent Interlude

  The news that Americans would be coming into the Tokyo area in only five days was terrifying to Japanese officials. They had good reason to worry.

  Scattered reports filtering into command posts reflected a series of plots against the Government and surrender. American reconnaissance planes had twice been attacked by Japanese fighters since the truce of the fifteenth. Atsugi was still a source of trouble. Though Kosono had been dragged away to a padded cell, his men refused to leave the airbase. Their planes were still operational, their spirits still inflamed with the passions of misguided patriotism. Now Atsugi was the designated landing place for the first American units, and yet it was not under control.

  Atsugi’s defiant sentiments were shared by many young men in the armed forces of the Empire. Already a detachment of soldiers had moved on Tokyo from Mito, a city to the north, to start another coup. They had come by train to a wooded area known as Ueno Park and encamped for the night on its slopes and grass.

  In downtown Tokyo, the Kempei Tai decided on a bold stroke to remove the threat to peace. Major Ishihara, one of the cohorts of Hatanaka and Koga during the attempted coup at the palace on August 14, was now released from his cell. Police had discovered that he was a close friend of the rebel leader at Ueno, and they hoped he would be able to dissuade his friend from rebellion. Ishihara had changed markedly in the past few days. Contrite over his role in the uprising, he was only too happy to cooperate with the Kempei Tai.

  On the evening of August 17, he went to Ueno Park, arriving just a little before midnight. Standing among hostile soldiers, he called to his friend, “Okajima, where are you?”

  Another officer rose in front of him and demanded, “What do you want with him?”

  Ishihara repeated, “Okajima—”

  The other man shot him dead.

  When the rebel Okajima was summoned to view the body, he began to cry. His aide ripped out his sword, lunged at Ishihara’s killer, and drove the weapon through his heart.

  At that moment, Okajima lost his zest for a coup. When representatives of General Tanaka pressured him the next morning to disperse his men, he quickly agreed.

  On the day after Kawabe returned from Manila, August 22, another crisis erupted on Atago Hill in Tokyo. A group of right-wing students, determined to resist the surrender, had been positioned in a building on top of the hill for several days; they had assembled an arsenal of ammunition and grenades. Already nervous over the pending Allied occupation, the police had quickly tried to quell the disturbance. On August 20, Kempei Tai colonel Makoto Tsukamoto walked up the slope to reason with the students. His pleas were ignored. Other police officials went to the top of Atago but were unable to disband the group. On August 22, armed men surrounded the rebels.

  A call went out to Yoshio Kodama, entrusted by the Government with the handling of such incidents around the capital. Through driving rain, Kodama went to the scene in the afternoon. Both in the building and on the drenched slopes below there were enough guns in possession of rebels and militia to start the war all over again. Kodama rushed to talk to the leader of the student group and discovered he was a long-time friend, Yoshio Iijima. Iijima explained that the rebels believed the Emperor to have been forced by his advisers to surrender. When Kodama told him that he was wrong, Iijima was crushed. He and his friends broke down and cried.

  When he recovered he asked, “Can we stay here at least till morning? Then we’ll leave and cause no further trouble.” Kodama promised to check with the police and left the building.

  A steady rain had now changed to a torrential downpour. At the bottom of the hill Kodama talked with the chief of police, who told him he could not take the responsibility for allowing the insurgents to stay longer than six o’clock that night. He had already issued them an ultimatum, he told Kodama, ordering them off the hill. If the insurgents refused to withdraw, he would have to follow his orders and send his own troops up after them. Then he added, “If you get permission from headquarters I’ll be happy to go along with their wishes.”

  Kodama ran back to the unhappy group at the top and outlined the problem. Iijima explained his reason for staying until morning: “We wanted to choose some men to die for their responsibility in this affair.” The pitiful group had decided to punish itself for its own indiscretion. Kodama begged them to delay their decision until he got back.

  Once more he ran down the hill in the driving rain, and once more he talked with the chief of police, who shouted over the fury of the storm: “I want to avoid any unnecessary sacrifices. I hope your efforts will succeed. Hurry back.” Kodama raced off in a car to Metropolitan Police Headquarters to get an extension on the six o’clock deadline, now only thirty minutes away.

  At three minutes to six, he returned armed with the power to negotiate with the rebels. As he got out of his car and looked up through the rain, he heard the reports of pistols being fired. They were followed almost instantly by an awesome series of shattering explosions which turned the top of Atago into a spreading column of black smoke. Kodama ran up the slope along with the police.

  When the police prematurely fired, the young men had linked themselves into a chain, and pulled pins from grenades. They lay sprawled on the ground, their entrails spilling out, their blood carpeting the grass. The leader, Iijima, his arm blown off, lay with his lungs shredded and exposed. Weeping from shock, Kodama knelt down beside him and washed his face with rain water as police began to collect the pieces of bodies that littered the grass of Atago.

  FROM THE JAPANESE IMPERIAL G.H.Q.

  TO THE SUPREME COMMANDER FOR THE ALLIED POWERS

  RADIOGRAM NO. 19 (AUG. 22)

  … IN SPITE OF OUR UTMOST EFFORTS TO AVOID CALAMITIES OF WAR, THE SITUATION IN CHINA HAS NOT BEEN IMPROVED AND THE ACTIVITIES OF IRREGULAR FORCES … ARE CAUSING SERIOUS DIFFICULTIES IN THE CESSATION OF HOSTILITIES.…

  Both in Japan and on the fringes of the Empire, trouble continued to plague the attempts at orderly surrender.

  On the evening of the twenty-third of August, another important meeting was held in Tokyo. The time had come to choose a man to meet the first Americans to land in Japan, and Japanese officials were anxious to select the proper delegate for this most delicate assignment. Upon this initial confrontation on the soil of Honshu itself might rest the character of the entire occupation.

  In the heavy downpour which again drenched Tokyo that day, one man drove to the conference hopeful of being chosen for the job. Lieutenant General Seizo Arisue, the ambitious Chief of Intelligence for the Imperial Army, knew that his countrymen had to choose a high-ranking officer for this extraordinary post. Supremely confident of his own abilities, he believed that his experiences with ranking American officers before the war would stand him in good stead when the first Americans arrived and occupation began. But he had no doubt that his nomination would be challenged. He had many enemies among Foreign Office personnel, and t
hey would probably try to prevent his selection. Arisue, a bantam-sized figure, enjoyed the prospect of a fight. A huge cigar clenched in his teeth, he got out of his limousine and walked into the midst of his enemies.

  His surmise had been correct. The Foreign Office spokesmen quickly revealed their hostility. Harsh words filled the air when his name was brought up for consideration. He was called a Fascist, a friend of Mussolini, and therefore eminently unsuited for the sensitive chore of greeting MacArthur. Premier Higashi-Kuni was particularly outspoken in supporting this objection to him. Arisue hastened to take up the fight.

  He could not deny that he and Mussolini had indeed become close during the period he had spent in Europe as part of his training. However, Arisue argued, just because he admired the Italian leader, it did not necessarily follow that he was a Fascist at heart.

  The argument dragged on for some time, with Arisue striking back at his detractors. Perhaps because of his defiant stand, perhaps because there was nothing more positive against him than guilt by association, supporters rallied to his side at a late hour, and General Arisue won out over the faction at the Foreign Office. He was instructed to go to Atsugi Airbase the next day, August 24, to prepare for the arrival of the Americans within forty-eight hours.

  When the cocky, bemedaled officer left the building and walked through the still pelting rain, he was both elated at his personal victory and appalled at the monumental challenge before him. Atsugi was a cauldron of intrigue, caused by dissident elements. It was also a badly damaged airstrip, in pitiable condition to receive the conquerors. Arisue went to bed wondering whether he could, in fact, cope with the responsibilities he had fought to assume.

  At twelve o’clock the next day he had further reason to doubt. Before leaving the meeting the night before, he had requested seventy men to be present at the noon hour to go with him to the airfield. Just ten arrived at the appointed time.