The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936-1945 (Modern Library War)

by Toland, John

  By nightfall on Sunday the Marines had wrested most of the airfield from the Japanese and pressed on yard by yard toward Motoyama village. Kuribayashi radioed Tokyo that after one week of combat, front-line troops had averaged 50 percent losses, and most of the machine guns and 60 percent of the big guns had been destroyed.

  The first picture Rosenthal had taken—the one snapped quickly as the large flag was being hoisted on Suribachi—would become the most famous picture of the war. It reached the United States in time to make the Sunday papers, where it was featured on the front page, including that of the New York Times. Its dramatic composition was unforgettable, symbolizing simultaneously heroism, suffering and accomplishment.†

  On Monday, the Marines went into battle under clear skies for the first time since the landing. But by noon the inevitable rain resumed, and the three-division attack slowly pushed forward until advance units of the 4th Division reached a formidable rise, Hill 382, to the right of Motoyama, where they were driven off by rockets and mortar rounds. The 4th pressed on the following morning, five battalions abreast. The vicious hand-to-hand fighting continued, bringing the division’s daily casualties up to 792.

  All along the line Marines suffered heavily, but morale remained high. Humorous signs proliferated in caves and were posted beside foxholes:

  SURIBACHI HEIGHTS REALTY COMPANY

  OCEAN VIEW

  COOL BREEZES

  FREE FIREWORKS NIGHTLY!

  COOK WANTED

  ICHIMOTO’S INN

  UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT

  SOON AVAILABLE TO PERSONNEL

  OF THE U. S. ARMY (WE HOPE)

  NOTICE: THIS FOXHOLE IS PRIVATELY OWNED AND WAS NOT CONSTRUCTED. WITH THE HELP OF THE FEDERAL HOUSING ADMINISTRATION, NOT BUILT FOR COMFORT BUT FOR SPEED.

  The mounting casualties also revived the altercation between the Army and the Marine Corps which had first surfaced in the press during the battle for Saipan. The San Francisco Examiner, a Hearst paper, declared in a front-page editorial on February 27 that there was “awesome evidence in the situation that the attacking American forces are paying heavily for the island, perhaps too heavily,” and that they were “in danger of being worn out before they ever reach the really critical Japanese areas.” The editorial went on to praise MacArthur as America’s best and most successful strategist:

  He wins all his objectives.

  He outwits and outmaneuvers and outguesses and outthinks the Japanese.

  HE SAVES THE LIVES OF HIS OWN MEN, not only for the future and vital operations that must be fought before Japan is defeated, but for their own safe return to their families and loved ones in the American homeland after the peace is won.

  It is our good fortune to have such a strategist as General MacArthur in the Pacific War.

  Why do we not USE him more, and indeed, why do we not give him supreme command in the Pacific war, and utilize to the utmost his rare military genius of winning important battles without the excessive loss of precious American lives?

  Marine policy was defended the following day by another San Francisco paper, the Chronicle:

  The recapture of the Philippines remains competent, energetic, and immensely heartening to the American people. We are proud of that job.

  To slur the United States Marines in one type of operation, however, to draw odious comparisons between theirs and the type of operations conducted by General MacArthur is to raise a sinister fantasy. To hint that the Marines die fast and move slowly on Iwo Jima because Marine and Naval leadership in that assault is incompetent is an attempt at a damnable swindle of the American people.

  The Chronicle does not propose to engage in controversy over the relative merits of our fighting forces in the various theaters of war. But neither does the Chronicle propose to remain mute when the United States Marines, or any force on the world battle line, is butchered at home to make a Roman holiday.

  The War Department itself was searching for ways to reduce casualties on all fronts. The most controversial had already been suggested to Admiral Nimitz by General Marshall’s office, which had previously made similar recommendations for the European theater of operations: the use of poison gas. There were large quantities on hand. Nimitz pondered its employment on Iwo Jima but concluded that “the United States should not be the first to violate the Geneva Convention.”‡

  General Schmidt’s prediction that the battle would be over in ten days was clearly overoptimistic. The Japanese still held more than half of the island. By early afternoon of the tenth day, however, the 3rd Division broke through the second Kuribayashi line, flooding into the rubble that once was the village of Motoyama. On the right the men of the 4th Division had nearly surrounded Hill 382, but it took them two more days to secure it.

  That morning—it was Saturday, March 3—the first plane set down on Airfield No. 1’s dirt strip, which Seabees had repaired and lengthened to 3,000 feet during the fighting. It was a Navy C-47 hospital plane from the Marianas with medical supplies and mail. A woman, Barbara Finch of Reuters, stepped out amid exploding shells. “How the hell did you get here?” a Marine shouted, and she was pushed in a tent, then under a jeep. She was hustled back aboard the plane, which lumbered down the runway on its return to Saipan. The second plane to arrive was a Curtiss R5C carrying 2½ tons of mortar ammunition.

  While the battle still raged, one of its primary aims was fulfilled. On Sunday a B-29 in distress heaved in sight; it was Dinah Might, which had dropped its payload on Tokyo. She was almost out of gas and the fuel selector valve would not switch to the auxiliary tanks. First Lieutenant Fred Malo dragged the field twice, then brought in the huge craft. She careened down the runway in a huge cloud of dust, sheering off a telephone pole with one wing and slamming to a stop just before she ran out of space. Faulty valve fixed, Dinah Might lifted off for Saipan, her eleven-man crew evangelists for the Marine Corps. (Six weeks later Malo and all but one of the crew would die—some over Kawasaki, Japan, and some on a takeoff crash at Tinian.) Admiral Spruance was watching with satisfaction from his quarter-deck on Indianapolis; it justified his urgent request to occupy the island.

  That morning Kuribayashi relayed a rambling report to the Army Vice Chief of Staff through the radio station at Chichi Jima. Its length was mute testimony to his fear that it might be his last message.

  … OUR FORCES ARE MAKING EVERY EFFORT TO ANNIHILATE THE ENEMY. BUT WE HAVE ALREADY LOST MOST GUNS AND TANKS AND TWO-THIRDS OF OFFICERS. WE MAY HAVE SOME DIFFICULTIES IN FUTURE ENGAGEMENTS. SINCE OUR HEADQUARTERS AND COMMUNICATION CENTER ARE NOW EXPOSED TO THE ENEMY’S FRONT LINE, WE FEAR WE MAY BE CUT OFF FROM TOKYO. OF COURSE, SOME STRONGPOINTS MAY BE ABLE TO FIGHT DELAYING BATTLES FOR SEVERAL MORE DAYS. EVEN IF THE STRONGPOINTS FALL, WE HOPE THE SURVIVORS WILL CONTINUE TO FIGHT TO THE END … WE ARE SORRY INDEED WE COULD NOT HAVE DEFENDED THE ISLAND SUCCESSFULLY.

  NOW I, KURIBAYASHI, BELIEVE THAT THE ENEMY WILL INVADE JAPAN PROPER FROM THIS ISLAND … I AM VERY SORRY BECAUSE I CAN IMAGINE THE SCENES OF DISASTER IN OUR EMPIRE. HOWEVER, I COMFORT MYSELF A LITTLE, SEEING MY OFFICERS AND MEN DIE WITHOUT REGRET AFTER STRUGGLING IN THIS INCH-BY-INCH BATTLE AGAINST AN OVERWHELMING ENEMY WITH MANY TANKS AND BEING EXPOSED TO INDESCRIBABLE BOMBARDMENTS.

  ALTHOUGH MY OWN DEATH APPROACHES, I CALMLY PRAY TO GOD FOR A GOOD FUTURE FOR MY MOTHERLAND. SINCE THERE MAY BE A GREAT CHANGE IN THE BATTLE SITUATION AND TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATIONS MAY BE CUT, I WOULD LIKE NOW TO APOLOGIZE TO MY SENIOR AND FELLOW OFFICERS FOR NOT BEING STRONG ENOUGH TO STOP THE ENEMY INVASION.

  He recalled the glory of ancient days; how the Mongols who took Eki and Tsushima islands were repelled on the shores of Kyushu.

  … BELIEVING THAT MY MOTHERLAND WILL NEVER GO DOWN IN RUIN, MY SOUL WILL ALWAYS ASSAULT THE DASTARDLY ENEMY AND DEFEND THE LANDS OF THE EMPIRE FOREVER.

  PLEASE NOTE OUR BATTLE REPORTS AND REMARKS SENT BY TELEGRAPH. IF THEY HELP MODIFY FUTURE MILITARY TACTICS AND TRAINING PLANS I SHALL BE VERY PLEASED.…

  FINALLY I HEREBY THANK MY SENIOR AND FEL
LOW OFFICERS AGAIN FOR THEIR KIND HELP DURING MY LIFE.

  I WOULD LIKE TO ADD THAT WE CO-OPERATED WELL WITH OUR NAVY UNTIL THE LAST MOMENT.

  GOOD-BYE, T. KURIBAYASHI

  Japanese resistance continued stronger than the Americans had expected, though there was little co-ordination among Kuribayashi’s units. Desperate measures were taken to stop American flamethrowing tanks: volunteers strapped explosives on their backs and became living booby traps as they lay concealed in the path of the advancing vehicles. Their situation seemed so hopeless to Major General Sadasue Senda, who had replaced the troublesome Osuga as commander of the 2nd Mixed Brigade, that he signaled Kuribayashi for permission to launch a final general attack. Kuribayashi angrily ordered him to hold his positions; leaving the caves would merely hasten the collapse of Iwo. But Senda, who had fought against the Russians in Manchuria, proved to be even more mutinous than Osuga. On the evening of March 8 he summoned his officers to his sweltering command cave, a deep labyrinth which reeked of sulphur. There, in the 120-degree heat, he read out instructions for a general attack: a barrage of howitzers, rockets and mortars at six o’clock the next evening would precede a mass assault south toward Mount Suribachi; the Navy would support the attack on both flanks. “I will always be at the head of the troops,” Senda declared. They passed around a single cup of water, to seal the order with a toast. Senda thanked them. “Let us all meet again at Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo.”

  The transmittal of his order to Navy headquarters, a mile away, was by word of mouth, which led to a misinterpretation: that the attack would take place that night—since Pearl Harbor, the eighth of every month had a special significance. In the darkness almost fifteen hundred Navy men from various units started stealthily toward the line of departure armed with bamboo spears, rifles, grenades and a few light machine guns.

  Lieutenant (s.g.) Satoru Omagari—in charge of the former “jet propulsion” rocket unit that had raised such havoc in the first days of fighting—led his 140 men out of their 75-foot-deep cave. He had orders to bring them to the Navy Cemetery, between airfields No. 2 and No. 3, where they would consolidate with other units. Harassed by sporadic mortar and artillery fire, and often lost in the unfamiliar terrain, Omagari arrived with fifteen men. In the sandy little valley there was chaos; more than a thousand men, hopelessly disorganized, milled around in the dark. At midnight the mob was started south toward the front-line positions of the 4th Division. They were to work cautiously through the cratered area, but undisciplined cries of “Banzai!” alerted the enemy. An almost instantaneous display of star-shell flares exposed the attackers. Mortar rounds threw up geysers of earth and ash. At least eight hundred men died.

  The troops in Omagari’s area were pinned down by machine guns. For an hour they crouched in shell holes or behind rocks awaiting the opportunity to steal back into their caves. But Omagari was not ready to give up. With several hundred men he began searching for an Army officer to lead them. He found the cave headquarters of an Army unit, the 26th Tank Regiment, but no one seemed to know anything about a general attack. The hot-blooded Omagari accused them of shirking, and almost came to blows with a captain. The argument brought out the commander’s adjutant, a major. He said there would be no attack. Kuribayashi had countermanded Senda’s order.

  The commander himself, Lieutenant Colonel Takeichi Nishi, joined them. He was a baron from a distinguished family, and Japan’s best-known horseman. In the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles he and his horse, Uranus, had won first prize in the individual jumping event. He invited Omagari and his men to stay on as replacements, but Omagari still refused to believe the attack was canceled. He visualized his Navy comrades retaking Suribachi without him. The battle-weary Nishi was tolerant. “If one wants to die,” he said, “he can do it any time. It is only fifty meters to the American positions.”

  Omagari impetuously left the cave, but by the time he had marshaled his men he realized it was too late to join the general attack. Downcast, he returned and offered his men to Nishi. But Omagari rejected cave warfare for himself. He volunteered to make himself a human bomb and throw himself under the treads of an enemy tank. He was promised his turn would come in a few days.

  The following afternoon a patrol from the 3rd Marine Division reached the northeastern end of the island. The men washed their faces in the sea and cavorted barefoot in the surf. They brought back a canteen of salt water, and as proof that the Japanese forces had been split in two, it was sent to General Schmidt with the inscription “For inspection, not consumption.” As far as Schmidt was concerned the battle was over, and he informed the Navy that he no longer needed carrier planes for close support. Admiral Turner was already on his way back to Guam.

  General Kuribayashi had prevented the launching of a full-fledged general attack, but Senda, who had initiated the idea, could not be restrained. Gathering all the forces in his immediate area that night, and with a grenade in each hand, he led the charge. Around his forehead was a white band emblazoned with the Rising Sun. The attack was as futile as Kuribayashi had predicted. Almost every man died, including Senda.

  By March 11 the Japanese were backed into small areas, one on the northeastern end of the island and the other on the northwest coast, where Kuribayashi and Admiral Ichimaru still held out in their deep caves while the remnants of their commands continued a suicidal defense. In the tankers’ cave, not far away, Omagari waited for darkness before setting out on his final mission. After midnight he left the cave with a box of dynamite on his back. He found five bodies near a gully—a logical route of advance for American tanks—and worked his way into the stinking pile, smearing his uniform and face with blood, and draping himself with entrails. Who will be using my guts tomorrow? he wondered.

  All through the day he waited, perspiring in the sun, for the clank of an enemy tank. The smell was nauseating. Huge bluebottle flies hovered overhead like buzzards. Why couldn’t the end come at once and cleanly? Scenes from his childhood and treacherous thoughts interrupted his wish for death. Was this what he had been educated and trained for? He and his generation had been reared only for war to believe it was beautiful and glorious to die for the Emperor. Was lying among the dead covered with stinking guts beautiful? He had revered the forty-seven ronin, under the impression that they exemplified the inherent characteristics of the Japanese. If so, why had he and his comrades been bombarded with propaganda designed to make them seek death in battle?

  With darkness he crept back to his cave. He tried to clean himself, but the stench of death clung tenaciously. He was irresistibly drawn back to the battlefield, where he spent another day among the corpses, agonizing over the meaning of life as a Japanese. Again no tanks appeared, and by nightfall he returned to the cave robbed of most of his illusions. He was sure of but one thing: never again would he venture out as a human bomb.

  Across the island in the other pocket, Navy Lieutenant Toshihiko Ohno and his men had been driven from place to place by the advancing Americans. Ohno had commanded an antiaircraft battery of fifty-four men, but now only five were left. In some ways Ohno, who was six feet tall and slender, was more like a young American officer fresh from OCS than a typical Japanese officer. A recent college graduate, sensitive and gentle of manner, he seemed unsuited to command men, but under fire he had matured. He and his men were huddled in a pillbox about eleven feet square. The entrance was blocked and they had crawled through the gun-port. They were sprawled on the concrete floor, sleeping off a feast; they had found two cases of hardtack and candy, three large bags of sugar, and a ten-gallon can half filled with water.

  A noise awakened Ohno. Through the porthole he saw a Marine helmet. As he drew his pistol, the helmet disappeared. There was a hissing noise, and a grenade bounded off the floor. Someone leaped in front of Ohno and tossed a blanket over the grenade just before it detonated. It exploded upward and no one was hit. Dazed, Ohno did not at first comprehend that a bundle of dynamite sticks had just been shoved into the porthole. He snatc
hed the smoldering blanket and used it to force the dynamite to the rear of the porthole. He leaped back, hugged the wall and shouted a warning. Everyone stuck thumbs in ears, middle fingers on noses and last two fingers over mouths. “Tenno Heika banzai!” he said to himself and visualized his wife and mother. “I’m ready …” The pillbox seemed to rise three feet in the air. It was as if his body were being pressed together by some unearthly force. He heard himself cry out, “Ahhh!”

  The pillbox swirled with smoke. “Are you all right?” he asked his men. All but an enlisted man named Kitagata replied. Through a hole where the ventilator had blown out, a shaft of light illuminated Kitagata. His head was bleeding and sand peppered his skin. He moaned. A shadow interposed the foggy shaft of light; a Marine was peering down. Ohno clamped a hand over Kitagata’s mouth. The shadow withdrew and someone outside shouted, “Let’s go!” They were safe for the moment.

  4.

  On March 14 a small group of Marine officers and men stood at attention around an incinerated Japanese bunker. A colonel representing Admiral Nimitz read a proclamation:

  “… United States forces under my command have occupied this and other of the Volcano Islands. All powers of government of the Japanese Empire in these islands so occupied are hereby suspended. All powers of government are vested in me as military governor and will be exercised by subordinate commanders under my direction.…”