The Kamikaze: Samurai Warrior A New Appraisal

The Kamikaze: Samurai Warrior A New Appraisal

 

This paper contains a number of factual errors, unsupported assertions, and questionable premises. In fact, the germ of the Kamikaze concept can be traced back to the carrier battles of 1942. The more perceptive Japanese officers realized that the USN's lead in fleet air defense, as exhibited in several carrier battles, nullified the IJN's superiority in aircraft and pilot training, and represented an obstacle to combating US carrier formations which would impose prohibitive losses on Japanese carrier units. The only conceivable way to overcome this problem was to institute either new weapons or tactics which could neutralize the US advantages.

Obviously, any new weapon would require some form of on-board guidance which would dramatically increase the hit probability of each projectile. Furthermore, as US AA capability became more accurate and longer ranged, the desirability of a "stand-off" type of weapon to preserve the scarce supply of trained pilots and delivery platforms became greater.

Since Japan did not have the technical capacity to develop (and more importantly, mass produce) an effective autonomous guidance system for airborne weapons, a human pilot was the only feasible alternative. The "stand off" aspect was inherent in the "Ohka" concept which was simply a glide bomb guided by a human pilot, intended to be carried to the vicinity of it's target and released some distance away to give the "mother" plane some chance of survival. The initial version of the Ohka had only a 20 nm range which was insufficient to allow release outside of the defending fighter screen, but later planned versions had ranges of 70 nm and 150 nm, which would have seriously complicated fleet air defense for the USN.

By the battle of the Philippine Sea (which the author of the paper erroneously refers to to as "the Battle of Saipan"), Japanese misgivings about countering USN fleet air defense had fully manifested themselves. Despite launching very strong air strikes against numerous targets, the IJN was unable to inflict any significant damage on the USN formations, and still suffered horrendous losses in planes, pilots, and aircrew. It was at this point that kamikaze tactics began to be quietly and privately discussed among senior Japanese naval leaders.

There was, by no means, unanimity among the naval leadership that suicide tactics would be effective, nor that they should be instituted, but enough officers felt they should be tried as a last ditch effort to demoralize USN personnel and break the fighting spirit of the US, that plans were put afoot to use them to counter the next big US offensive. In the event, kamikaze tactics were too little, and too late, but due to desperation and the peculiar atmosphere of peer pressure which prevailed in the Japanese armed forces, they gained an odd kind of momentum. It's true that exaggerated reports of enemy losses added to the pressure on the Japanese IGHQ to continue the use of such tactics, but there is no evidence of a deliberate conspiracy, as the author of the paper implies, to mislead the Japanese leadership about the efficacy of the kamikaze operations.

 

Thanks DA, I'm not by all means very familiar with the Pacific war, but I found this might be of interest.

What would you think of this? http://www.ww2f.com/158322-post7.html

 

I would have to agree with the general thrust of the article, though I'm not sure there is much correlation between the islamic homicide bombers and the motivation of the Japanese kamikaze units at the end of WW II. I believe that the Japanese had much more in common with the Allied pilots than we here in the West tend to think.

My father was a USN carrier pilot from 1940 to 1946 and participated in most of the Pacific carrier battles during that period. When I could get him to talk about his experiences, he again and again stated that he and his colleagues did not expect to survive the war, even when the US was obviously winning it in late 1944. Despite this fatalistic attitude, he and others continued to fly and fight, even when they could have, with little effort or criticism, allowed themselves to be grounded. I see little difference between this attitude and the attitude of the Japanese pilots except the Japanese had perhaps more justification for feeling that way.

There is no doubt in my mind that certain senior Japanese officers took advantage of this attitude to establish the kamikaze units and initiate suicide attacks. What their motivation was, patriotism, misplaced pride, desperation, or a misguided semi-religious mysticism, I cannot say. But I will say that, under similar desperate circumstances, I believe that American pilots could have, and would have, engaged in similar self-destructive tactics. Whether there were senior American commanders who would have ordered them to do so, I don't know, but I would certainly hope not. However, in essence, I do not see that the individual Japanese pilots who deliberately crashed their planes into enemy ships were so very different in their outlook than American or other Allied pilots. I believe they did so out of a love for their country and a desire to protect their families from the consequences of a devastating and ill-advised war.

That the senior Japanese commanders felt it necessary to ruthlessly exploit these very human emotions is not to their, or the Japanese militarists', credit. However, having said that, I think that the Japanese culture of unquestioning obedience is also partially to blame. I cannot see American pilots obeying orders to kill themselves in such a manner, although I firmly believe they would do so voluntarily in furtherance of their own personal beliefs.

Of course, I am speaking generally, and fully realize that, as in any group of human beings, individuals will vary widely in their feelings and motivations, and that there will be many exceptions to the general rule of behavior.

 

Or even the ones that lived.

Jacklyln "Jack" Lucas was just six days past his 17th birthday in February 1945 when his heroism at Iwo Jima earned him the nation's highest military honor. He used his body to shield three fellow squad members from two grenades, and was nearly killed when one exploded.

"A couple of grenades rolled into the trench," Lucas said in an Associated Press interview shortly before he received the medal from President Truman in October 1945. "I hollered to my pals to get out and did a Superman dive at the grenades. I wasn't a Superman after I got hit. I let out one helluva scream when that thing went off."

He was left with more than 250 pieces of shrapnel in his body and in every major organ and endured 26 surgeries in the months after Iwo Jima.

He was the youngest serviceman to win the Medal of Honor in any conflict other than the Civil War.

"By his inspiring action and valiant spirit of self-sacrifice, he not only protected his comrades from certain injury or possible death but also enabled them to rout the Japanese patrol and continue the advance," the Medal of Honor citation said.

http://www.ww2f.com/roll-honor-memo...r-ii-became-youngest-marine-receive-mohl.html

 

One thing is heroic self-sacrifice at the spur of the moment on your own initiative, as in the examples you mention, or other desperate circunstances for instance a pilot in a plane with no fuel, out of ammo, damaged and with a worthwhile target available. Selfless, voluntary sacrifice.

An entirely different thing would be a unit commander deliberately ordering a man "Jump on that grenade NOW because I say so!". To me it's not the same thing at all.

 

I would agree that there are some some important differences between a spur-of-the-moment, instinctive, self-sacrifice, such as throwing one's self on a grenade to save one's buddies, and the situation where a man has a chance to reflect rationally, at least for a few minutes, on one's death and the reasons pro and con. An example of the second situation would be the death of Cmdr. John Cromwell, and others, when the USS Sculpin was lost. Cromwell was privy to much information about the pending Operation Galvanic and chose to ride the Sculpin down on her last dive rather than risk Japanese interrogation.

In fact, I believe three different situations existed; The first two mentioned above, and a third wherein an organized attempt was made by a third party or parties (such as one's commander or comrades) to force one, by orders or peer pressure, to deliberately kill one's self. The situation which existed in the Japanese armed forces near the end of WW II was one where there was a semi-official policy of coercing young men to kill themselves, and even occasionally ordering them to do so. As far as I know, the only military to actually use legal or social pressure to enforce such a policy was the Japanese, although, it may be that the Soviets, Chinese, and Germans may have come close at times in certain situations.

There were very probably examples of the first two situations in almost every country's armed forces during WW II, but I don't believe anyone in the US military services was ever ordered to commit certain suicide. The Japanese have claimed that service in the kamikaze units was voluntary, but I think there is enough evidence to conclude that strong psychological pressure was exerted on young Japanese men to force participation in many (perhaps the majority) of cases. I don't believe there is any evidence that some were "chained" into their cockpits or that canopies were "bolted shut".

I think Japanese pilots were very much like any other country's pilots in their outlook on service to their country and their own potential death; they were willing to sacrifice their lives, but only if in doing so, they could help protect their country, their families and friends. The crime, if it may be so labeled, of the Japanese senior command was that it was willing to exploit such an attitude to send hundreds of young men to their deaths even after it became obvious that the course of the war could not be changed by such methods.

None of this is, in any way, intended to reflect criticism of, or denigrate the courage of, any man who willingly gives his life in the service of his country, or to save his friends and protect his family. To sacrifice one's own life for such ideals, whether instinctively or after sober reflection, is the finest, most noble thing a man can do.

 

Very well said, DA.
The only thing that I can think of that comes closest IMO to being a suicide mission is Doolittle's raid on Tokyo. It was not a suicide mission but it certainly was a very high risk mission.
High risk missions, though very dangerous, still give those going on that mission a chance to be return alive. The Divine Wind Special Attack Corps was a one-way street.

 

but very effective. killing over 5000 sailors in the attacks off Okinawa. a life and death battle between men fighting to live against men fighting to die.