Hooper’s War

by Peter Van Buren

  “It is my turn, is it not, Eichi? You kept the photo of us much longer than our arrangement said you should,” Naoko said.

  “I have no excuse. But, my manners. Your parents, are they well? The Professor? Your dear mother?” Nakagawa said.

  “This war, as you said, came for all of us. But now, Eichi, there is a small amount of tea left, and today is a day one saves things for. We have much to talk about.”

  It grew quiet. I stayed hidden. The screech whistle of the tea kettle scared the hell out of me.

  “Naoko, when we last saw one another, I was not sure of my feelings. Yet in each difficult moment since I have looked at our photo, and gained the strength to know I have lived this long to be here. Wait. Naoko, why is there an American rifle by the desk there? Is everything…”

  Hearing the man’s voice in Japanese change to one of alarm, I knew I had to move, for my safety, and for hers.

  “Hooper-san, put that pistol down. It is okay,” Naoko said.

  “Tell him, Naoko, tell him hands up or I’ll shoot him,” I said. “Dammit, Naoko, you’re in danger here.”

  “Hooper, he is not the one pointing a gun,” Naoko said.

  “Naoko, who is this American? Get behind me for your safety,” Nakagawa said.

  “Naoko, get behind me so you don’t get hurt. I’m gonna kill the bastard,” I said, finger on the trigger.

  “Naoko, tell the barbarian not to harm you. He can kill me but he has to let you go,” Nakagawa said.

  “Naoko, what do you want me to do?” I said.

  “Naoko, what do you want me to do?” Nakagawa said. He reached for his pistol.

  “Enough. Eichi, yamete. Hooper-san, stop, now. Anatachi no aida ni watashi wa tatsu wa. If you kill one another, you will kill me. Hikigane o hikeba watashi o korosu koto ni naru. On the count of three, both of you lower your guns. One—Ichi—Two—Ni— Three—San.”

  “Okay, Naoko, who the hell is this yellow bastard?” I said. We each lowered our weapon.

  “Naoko, who is this white devil?” Nakagawa said.

  “Quiet, both of you. I will translate, and I will explain. Put those… damn guns away. There will be no war in my house,” Naoko said.

  “Nan de aitsu ga koko ni irun da?” Nakagawa said.

  “Eichi, this American officer came here on his own with a wounded soldier, seeking help, as you have.”

  “Wait, Naoko,” Nakagawa said. “This white man seated across from me is a soldier? Why for God’s sake is he dressed in a Japanese man’s clothing? Has he harmed you? Your father would never rest if he learned you were no longer as he knew you, especially at the hands of this animal.”

  “No, he did not… touch me, Eichi. I am still the girl as you knew her back home. He has been kind to me. He needed fresh clothes.”

  “I will not raise my weapon, but I will keep it close. If I see even a glance I do not like, I will kill him in that second. I have not found you to lose you again,” Nakagawa said.

  “Hai, hai, wakarimasu, Eichi. Wakarimasu yo,” Naoko said. She turned to me. “Hooper-san, please, listen. You must leave. I cannot have you both in this house. What if more Japanese soldiers come?”

  There I was, once a soldier, now dressed in Japanese clothing taken from a dead man. I must have stood a foot taller than Naoko’s father, something I only now came to see, with his sleeves coming to my elbows, and his pant legs ending below my knees. I realized I still had on my olive green GI socks. I might as well have been wearing a dress.

  “Hooper-san, you do not understand,” Naoko said. “I did not invite you into this house, and no one asked you to come to my country. You invaded both places. I helped care for your wounded man Jones-san. But now I have no obligation left to you.”

  “Naoko, please—”

  “Hooper-san, no. I cannot hear that, it is not fair now. You are a butterfly. How long have you even been in Japan, less than a month? Are you planning to marry me, meet my neighbors, stand in line with me at the market?”

  “No, no, Naoko. Come with me. Once we reach American lines, there must be some refugee program or something we can get you into,” I said.

  “Is that what I am to you, Hooper-san, something to save, a lost dog to take in? Perhaps as with a dog you can call me whatever new name you like. How about Jenny?” Naoko said. Where I expected her voice to rise, it thinned. “There are so many things you do not understand.”

  Chapter 11: Ashes

  Former Lieutenant Nathaniel Hooper: Retirement Home, Kailua, Hawaii, 2017

  I COULDN’T STAY WITH Naoko like I was Anne Frank; the Battle for Nishinomiya and what happened to Jones that had put me in her house were long gone, Kyoto was yet to come, and I knew I had to leave, find my way back to American lines.

  But none of the three of us in Naoko’s house anticipated the American air strikes when the weather broke, or the equally fierce snow that followed. Steel or snow: I was pushed into the impossible situation of staying in that house with Sergeant Nakagawa and Naoko until something cleared up.

  Naoko was caught not just between Nakagawa’s and my intentions, but translating between us. We remained wary, but were curious to come face-to-face with our enemy. Naoko realized a diversion was necessary. It would be chess; she would teach us the game she learned from her father and we would play, two soldiers under her orders. The damn board had been staring at us from the corner since we each arrived anyway. We would be occupied in enough of a competition, and her need to translate would be minimized to chess taunts. Or so she thought.

  No doubt like her father, Naoko proved to be a good teacher. I had some sense of the fundamentals from back at school. Nakagawa played shogi, a Japanese chess-like game. Both pitted pieces of various strengths against one another. Both demanded a winner and a loser. Nakagawa and I took to the game with grim determination.

  This was war.

  Lieutenant Nathaniel Hooper: Japan, Naoko’s House, 1946

  “LIEUTENANT HOOPER, THOSE ARE two more of your pawns,” Nakagawa said.

  “That’s what they’re for, Sergeant Nakagawa. They go to war knowing they’ll be taken for no real point,” I said.

  “No, their sacrifice will have purpose. They just may not understand it until after their death,” Nakagawa said.

  “Nah, they’re just dead. Like you, Nakagawa. Your unit probably thinks you surrendered. Why not walk outside and blow your head off yelling banzai or something? Or you expect me to do it for you?”

  “You do not understand, do you, Lieutenant Hooper? Because you stand to one side, when you fall it will have no meaning but to remove you from this earth. If I had two lives I would not care about this one. But since I have only the one, simple death is not enough.”

  “That matters, Nakagawa, after you’re gone?” I said. “Dead is dead.”

  “You speak as if my life was more important to you, Lieutenant, than it is to me. I value my own life only because I must use it to die properly. You have been taught to kill as the highest expression of patriotism; we have been taught to die for the same end. We say in Japanese that ‘Life is one generation, what you leave behind is forever.’ Why do you Americans treasure your own small lives anyway, just to use them for nothing? To go home? Watch baseball and purchase a new car? Living is easy; it is dying well that is hard. A soldier’s life should be the search for the right place to die,” Nakagawa said.

  “Like those suicide bombers who threw away their lives under our tanks at Nishinomiya? Why didn’t they just fight like your damned samurai?” I said.

  “If we had tanks left to kill you with we would certainly do so, Lieutenant,” Nakagawa said. “But under the current circumstances, those suicide bombers are our heavy weapons. Our bravery must be earned in close, as men on the very ground, not at 20,000 feet like cowards.”

  “Every American soldier out there is willing to die for his country, Nakagawa, so cut the crap.”

  “You claim they are willing to die, but then wait for some battlefield accid
ent, or perhaps a well-aimed shot from one of my men, to kill them,” Nakagawa said. “We are not simply willing to die, we step onto the battlefield, or into a Special Attack plane, knowing we will die. Our loved ones cherish that. The cowards are the ones who fight not to die.”

  “What you think is noble is crazy, Nakagawa.”

  He was quickly on his feet, the chess board slipping to the edge of the table.

  “Baka yaro! What you think is noble is crazy, Lieutenant! Nan de aitsu ga koko ni irun da!”

  “So you wake up every morning with a plan to die?” I said.

  “I go to sleep dreaming of a proper death,” Nakagawa said.

  “And that goes for your whole country? That why Japan won’t surrender? Do we have to kill every goddamn one of you?”

  “The leaders of Japan have been entrusted with the salvation and not the destruction of our nation,” Nakagawa said as he retook his seat. “We may all need to die for that.”

  “And so why are you still alive, Nakagawa, here at Naoko’s side, talking about your future and some damn old photo?”

  Nakagawa said nothing. He reached to shift a chess piece, but his shaking hand knocked it over instead.

  “You two boys must stop,” Naoko said, alternating between our two languages. “Do not turn my father’s beloved chess into something else. I will not translate any more of your nonsense. And Eichi, what has happened to you? You are no longer the sweet boy I knew back home.” She switched to me, in English. “Hooper-san, talk with him. Please, explain how you feel about this war now. I… I… do not know if I want him… to go away.”

  She could not find a comfortable place to look in the room. I knew I had no choice but to talk with Nakagawa, for her. I tried to lighten my own thoughts first, so I secretly renamed the bishop on the board Chaplain Savage.

  “Um, Sergeant Nakagawa, before me, had you ever met an American?” I said.

  “I killed fourteen. Does that count?” Nakagawa said.

  “Nakagawa, tell me, honestly. Do you really think Japan can win somehow? We have more men, more tanks, hell, even more food,” I said.

  “Yes, but Japan has never been conquered by an outside enemy. We speak of the kamikaze, the divine wind, actually a great storm that blew the invading Mongol fleet out to sea in what you call the 13th century. Twice. Look at the blizzard outside. It is no coincidence.”

  “America won’t be stopped by a little snow, Nakagawa,” I said.

  “You presently are, Lieutenant Hooper,” Nakagawa said. He returned his attention to the board. “Check.”

  “To hell with the weather, why do you really think you can win this war?” I said. I moved my queen out of harm’s way.

  “Because this country is ours, and you are just playing a game here,” Nakagawa said. He slammed down his next move, the sound more a rifle shot than wood striking wood. “My knight puts you in check, Lieutenant. The knights are the key to winning. Oh, not check. I was mistaken. Checkmate.”

  “Dammit. Set ’em up again. Tell me, Nakagawa, do you want to kill me?” I said.

  “When I first entered this home, you were prepared to kill me,” Nakagawa said. “Bishop takes pawn.”

  “I’d kill you, but only if I had to, for Naoko’s sake,” I said. “Your move.”

  “I didn’t kill you, for Naoko’s sake. Move.”

  “So yesterday we’d kill each other. Maybe tomorrow a politician who calls the shots far away from the shooting will tell us to cease fire, and we’ll stop. You don’t see it, do you, Sergeant Nakagawa? This war tricks us into thinking we have to do what we’re told is necessary, some kind of obligation. Half the evil in the world is done with those words.”

  Air raid sirens; American planes were coming.

  “It appears your own knights are after you now, Lieutenant,” Nakagawa said. “If they strike us the game is over. Mmm, a last move; my knight takes your queen.”

  Lieutenant Nathaniel Hooper: Japan, Naoko’s House, 1946

  I WOKE TO THE smell of cold. The air felt undisturbed, and there was no earthy scent from the tea Naoko usually prepared, none of the hisses and clinks that were her in the morning. On the low table across from me were two notes, one in Japanese and one in English.

  Sergeant Nakagawa entered the room, in uniform, armed. He swept the note in English aside, and read the other. I saw his hand slide down the length of his rifle. He slapped in a full magazine, five rounds if he needed them all. He took the safety off. Our eyes met.

  “Kedo, ore wa Naoko no tame ni, koko de ima omae o korosanai ga, oretachi wa izure jigoku ni ochiru daro yo,” Nakagawa said.

  I couldn’t understand him without Naoko, but when he spat on the floor his meaning was clear enough. I braced myself. Nakagawa then surprised me by stepping out the front door. He didn’t bother shutting it behind him, and as it swung in the wind I stepped forward, seeing him walk off into the distance. I picked up the note in English:

  I WATCHED THE CLOUDS chase each other many times, covering great distances with ease, and wished I could be like them. I will return to my parents’ old house outside Kyoto. Perhaps one day I will see you again, Lieutenant Nathaniel Hooper. Sometimes tears are sad, and sometimes they are needed to wash away things so one may see clearly. Naoko.

  THE DOOR WAS STILL open, as Nakagawa had left it. My old uniform, stiff with Jones’ blood, lay in the backyard. It did not belong to me anymore. I wore Naoko’s father’s clothing, with one of his hats low on my head, a disguise of sorts.

  Before Naoko’s House, The Battle for the Nishinomiya Rail Junction

  Chapter 12: Because That’s the Way It Works

  Lieutenant Nathaniel Hooper: Japan, Large American Encampment, Near Nishinomiya Train Station, 1946

  ON THE WAY INTO Nishinomiya, ahead of massing for the battle planned for there, we walked through the place where we’d heard that American soldier had assaulted a local. There was not just the one house we’d been told had been torched to hide the crime, but several, burned to the ground. Everyone said that can’t be us, we’re the good guys, but there was that smell, that goddamn smell that was becoming too familiar to a kid from rural Ohio. I saw a couple of scraggly farm animals lying shot in the street, the birds having picked them over when the locals refused to. It takes a lot of hate to stay that hungry.

  Maybe that’s why as we moved through this village there were no old men who bowed to us, no kids curious enough to want to play soldier. They’d seen what soldiers do. I’d heard from buddies who fought in Europe about the crowds there, welcoming them as they walked through liberated small villages like this. The kids, they said, played that age-old game, soldier versus street rat, them begging for candy, us for fun teaching the little brats to cuss in English, then maybe asking playfully after their older sisters. “Hey Joe, you okay, Joe.”

  There was a U.S. Army field jacket and one boot off to the side of the road. Who’d take off their jacket in this weather? Japanese eyes walked us through. If we could talk to each, they’d confess how easily they moved from being afraid of us to wanting revenge against us.

  “WE’RE BACK IN THE U.S. of A. now, at least close enough,” Polanski said. “Base camp, with all the trimmings. Beats living in the field any day.”

  Base camp also meant it was time for me to do something every infantry leader since the Roman Legions had had to do: inspect feet. This had been drummed into me in training, held to be nearly as important as map reading, how to make a bed so a quarter will bounce off it, and how to lay out your gear properly on a GI blanket for inspection. These were strange things for someone like myself, only months out of Mom and Dad’s house, to have learned.

  Infantry lived on their feet, so it was a practical thing, but it was also a ritual that showed an officer cared about his men. So, with a lot of joking I was duty-bound to absorb, the men all found places to sit and took off, for the first time in how many days, their boots. I poked at tender blisters on a few, causing one to shout out “Mom!” I told another t
o go see the doc over a cut that was festering, and I slapped at the soles of the others, their toes all wrinkled and damn near fermented from sweat inside their green wool socks. Dry socks, people said, were worth more in the field than any quantity of brains or balls. I asked Sergeant Laabs to settle the men in. I had to go see Captain Christiansen again. I’d rather have stuck with the feet.

  Lieutenant Nathaniel Hooper: Captain Christiansen’s Command Area, 1946

  CAPTAIN CHRISTIANSEN HAD TAKEN over what was left of a Japanese house as his office. Something had blown out the windows, and the endless rounds of soldiers walking past had ground up what looked like it had once been a small garden.

  Unlike at the Ashiya Beachhead which we were building up into a small town, this place was not treated as much more than a rough camp site, occupied with the hope only that it’d be useful for the day or two we intended to duke it out at Nishinomiya. The heavy lifting of logistics for the battle was mostly over, and only needed the tightening of a few screws here and there.

  I met Captain Christiansen outside the house. There were a couple of the Captain’s aides there with him, smarmy bastards I remembered from Day One. They tried to look busy while all the time leaning in in hopes of seeing me get chewed out again. With a jerk of his head, Captain Christiansen sent them on their way. He looked at me like a horse he was still unsure about betting on.

  “A couple of days ago you were ready to cry like a schoolgirl. Better now, Hooper?” Captain Christiansen said. “I forgot your first name or I’d call you by it and make you feel all warm and cozy.”

  “Nathaniel sir, people at home call me Nate.”

  “Hooper, take this cigarette off me, and listen up. Things have changed ’cause of the weather turning bad. The chance of air cover now is zero point shit. And we’ve been seeing more suicide attacks, Japs filling backpacks with explosives and running into our lines. The ones that crawl under our tanks strapped with explosives call themselves ‘Sherman Carpets.’ There’s a shooting war on up here.”