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Blossoms in the Wind: Human Legacies of the Kamikaze
A revelatory and groundbreaking account of Imperial Japan’s kamikaze—the suicide pilots of World War II—as told through the eyes of the survivors
In the final year of World War II, a horrific new weapon was unleashed in the the kamikaze. Idealistic, young Japanese men had been taught that there was no greater glory than to sacrifice one’s life to defend the homeland. Now, with the war all but lost, thousands of these determined warriors were hastily trained in the basics of piloting an airplane, then sent out in waves to crash into enemy warships, suicide attacks that killed altogether some seven thousand American sailors.
But what of those men who took the sacred oath to die in battle and lived? In the wake of 9/11, ethnographer M. G. Sheftall was given unprecedented access to the cloistered community of Japan’s last remaining kamikaze survivors. As an American fluent in Japanese, Sheftall was the only westerner to ever sit face-to-face with these men and hear their stories. The result is a fascinating journey into the lives, indoctrination, and mindsets of the kamikaze, through the eyes of participants who are now lost to time.
In the final year of World War II, a horrific new weapon was unleashed in the the kamikaze. Idealistic, young Japanese men had been taught that there was no greater glory than to sacrifice one’s life to defend the homeland. Now, with the war all but lost, thousands of these determined warriors were hastily trained in the basics of piloting an airplane, then sent out in waves to crash into enemy warships, suicide attacks that killed altogether some seven thousand American sailors.
But what of those men who took the sacred oath to die in battle and lived? In the wake of 9/11, ethnographer M. G. Sheftall was given unprecedented access to the cloistered community of Japan’s last remaining kamikaze survivors. As an American fluent in Japanese, Sheftall was the only westerner to ever sit face-to-face with these men and hear their stories. The result is a fascinating journey into the lives, indoctrination, and mindsets of the kamikaze, through the eyes of participants who are now lost to time.
496 pages, Hardcover
First published June 27, 2005
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January 21, 2023
Having read accounts by Kamikaze pilots before, I can tell that the best part of this book about the Tokku is the stories of the pilots themselves, both those that died on mission and those that survived and told the tale to the author.
But the problem, for me, is that there's less of them than you'd expect from a history book dedicated to them. The stories are very few for a book of this length, fewer than a dozen, and many of them already dead, and even so, there's needless filler. There's more about the author himself than necessary, for example, and the Americans' side almost reads like it's a view of the Kamikaze filtered through the personal opinions of the winning side, which for me defeats the purpose of the book's stated goals to discover what kind of society and culture could produce men willing to die crashing a bomb-loaded plane into American ships. The book starts not with the Kamikaze themselves, but from the POV of the American Seventh Fleet's Taffy 3, their reaction to the Kamikaze post-Battle of Samar, and nothing about the pilots themselves, which will come a few chapters later.
And when the parts with the pilots themselves come, there's a lot of assumptions about thoughts and feelings and even emotional responses, that the author would have no way of knowing because all those people are dead. I get that many readers love this "reads like a novel" style of non-fiction, but to me it isn't either very academic or professional to delve into the personal emotions of dead people for the sake of writing beautifully. Those people didn't leave their emotions registered, you're ascribing that to them, and by default there'll be projection.
As for the pilots that survived and told their story, they're the most interesting and the portions of the book most worth reading, because of their war experiences, how they survived and that they had to live to deal with the shame and conflicted feelings of the crushing defeat of Japan. It's interesting how many of them have a rather whitewashed view of the war, that Sheftall readily relies forth, in which it's all about emperor, duty, honour, and country, riding Asia of the white conquerors. I understand that is their way of thinking, not the author's, but you know why it's uncomfortable? Because Sheftall doesn't challenge them, and he doesn't merely act like a recorder relaying the pilots' version of history either, because even though he doesn't agree with them, he does write like he sympathises. There's a lot of admiring, borderline Japanese culture hero-worship, passages here in which Sheftall talks on and on about samurai, warrior's spirit, the incomprehensible-to-Westerners sense of sacrifice of the Japanese, etc. No rebuttal there.
And that's what made me feel uncomfortable. At one point, Sheftall clearly states that this mentality was a product of decades of indoctrination and societal norms that aided in compliance of the population, all those young men who died with a Banzai! on their lips were the product of indoctrination, which included ideological grooming and falsities created to support the whole Tokku system and the willingness of the whole country of 100 million to go down in flames rather than surrender to the US. Why does he not challenge this? When German veterans are interviewed, they are relentlessly challenged in their assumptions, and those who were young at the time of recruitment are readily acknowledged to be a product of heavy indoctrination. Plus, Hitler gave orders for Germany to go down in flames with him rather than surrender, too. So why the different approach? Why challenge Germany and not Japan? Why call German veterans indoctrinated by an evil ideology but excuse Japanese veterans with "oh, it's their culture, samurai, ya know" type of arguments? We all understand a boy growing up in the Hitlerjugend and becoming a fanatical SS-man willing to fight to the end is an awful outcome of indoctrination, so why do we try to explain away as a matter of culture a Japanese boy growing up with militaristic and ultranationalistic propaganda that tells him his race is the superior one and turns him into a pilot that slaps a bomb on to himself to at best maim a ship?
Yes, I do get that Japanese culture has unique differences that set it apart. Fanaticism born of indoctrination is the same across cultures, however, a point that needs be stressed. Furthermore, I have seen at least a couple of other accounts by Kamikaze that survived, and I can tell that not every veteran ex-pilot of the Imperial Japanese Navy has this view expressed by the pilots in this book. There are Japanese veterans who do understand the futility of the war, the indoctrination they were subjected to, and that they were used by their government, and don't have this romanticised "lost cause" view. It would've been nice for variety at least, to have some of them included too.
The avoidance on the part of the author to delve into the Yasukuni Shrine controversy didn't sit well with me either, more so since he visited it. It just adds to the book's feel of not wanting to touch on thorny issues and just go with the sanitised sacrifice, duty & honour narrative to interpret the whole point of the Kamikaze existing.
I received an ARC through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
But the problem, for me, is that there's less of them than you'd expect from a history book dedicated to them. The stories are very few for a book of this length, fewer than a dozen, and many of them already dead, and even so, there's needless filler. There's more about the author himself than necessary, for example, and the Americans' side almost reads like it's a view of the Kamikaze filtered through the personal opinions of the winning side, which for me defeats the purpose of the book's stated goals to discover what kind of society and culture could produce men willing to die crashing a bomb-loaded plane into American ships. The book starts not with the Kamikaze themselves, but from the POV of the American Seventh Fleet's Taffy 3, their reaction to the Kamikaze post-Battle of Samar, and nothing about the pilots themselves, which will come a few chapters later.
And when the parts with the pilots themselves come, there's a lot of assumptions about thoughts and feelings and even emotional responses, that the author would have no way of knowing because all those people are dead. I get that many readers love this "reads like a novel" style of non-fiction, but to me it isn't either very academic or professional to delve into the personal emotions of dead people for the sake of writing beautifully. Those people didn't leave their emotions registered, you're ascribing that to them, and by default there'll be projection.
As for the pilots that survived and told their story, they're the most interesting and the portions of the book most worth reading, because of their war experiences, how they survived and that they had to live to deal with the shame and conflicted feelings of the crushing defeat of Japan. It's interesting how many of them have a rather whitewashed view of the war, that Sheftall readily relies forth, in which it's all about emperor, duty, honour, and country, riding Asia of the white conquerors. I understand that is their way of thinking, not the author's, but you know why it's uncomfortable? Because Sheftall doesn't challenge them, and he doesn't merely act like a recorder relaying the pilots' version of history either, because even though he doesn't agree with them, he does write like he sympathises. There's a lot of admiring, borderline Japanese culture hero-worship, passages here in which Sheftall talks on and on about samurai, warrior's spirit, the incomprehensible-to-Westerners sense of sacrifice of the Japanese, etc. No rebuttal there.
And that's what made me feel uncomfortable. At one point, Sheftall clearly states that this mentality was a product of decades of indoctrination and societal norms that aided in compliance of the population, all those young men who died with a Banzai! on their lips were the product of indoctrination, which included ideological grooming and falsities created to support the whole Tokku system and the willingness of the whole country of 100 million to go down in flames rather than surrender to the US. Why does he not challenge this? When German veterans are interviewed, they are relentlessly challenged in their assumptions, and those who were young at the time of recruitment are readily acknowledged to be a product of heavy indoctrination. Plus, Hitler gave orders for Germany to go down in flames with him rather than surrender, too. So why the different approach? Why challenge Germany and not Japan? Why call German veterans indoctrinated by an evil ideology but excuse Japanese veterans with "oh, it's their culture, samurai, ya know" type of arguments? We all understand a boy growing up in the Hitlerjugend and becoming a fanatical SS-man willing to fight to the end is an awful outcome of indoctrination, so why do we try to explain away as a matter of culture a Japanese boy growing up with militaristic and ultranationalistic propaganda that tells him his race is the superior one and turns him into a pilot that slaps a bomb on to himself to at best maim a ship?
Yes, I do get that Japanese culture has unique differences that set it apart. Fanaticism born of indoctrination is the same across cultures, however, a point that needs be stressed. Furthermore, I have seen at least a couple of other accounts by Kamikaze that survived, and I can tell that not every veteran ex-pilot of the Imperial Japanese Navy has this view expressed by the pilots in this book. There are Japanese veterans who do understand the futility of the war, the indoctrination they were subjected to, and that they were used by their government, and don't have this romanticised "lost cause" view. It would've been nice for variety at least, to have some of them included too.
The avoidance on the part of the author to delve into the Yasukuni Shrine controversy didn't sit well with me either, more so since he visited it. It just adds to the book's feel of not wanting to touch on thorny issues and just go with the sanitised sacrifice, duty & honour narrative to interpret the whole point of the Kamikaze existing.
I received an ARC through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
March 10, 2020
A very interesting 4 Star book by a Westerner schooled and fluent in the Japanese language and culture who gets elderly Japanese prospective kamikaze pilots, boat drivers and other survivors to tell their stories. How can you interview a kamikaze pilot? At least one was shot up and limped into a Japanese Naval airfield. Others trained hard but never got the chance to execute their planned mission. Think how hard it is to get Allied WWII veterans to talk about their experiences…now imagine how difficult it was for this outsider to get the stories of these veterans who “failed” in their last mission. If the author has gotten too close to the Japanese veterans, as many reviewers comment, he had to go that route to get the real story. One other reason for the book is the 9/11 attack and the common analogy made by the news media and others that suicide airplanes were not a new phenomenon. Sheftall makes it clear these kamikaze pilots see their course of action as a legal and valid military tactic, motivated by patriotism, using military assets against military targets. The 9/11 and other modern suiciders are motivated by hate and seek out civilians and non-military targets.
The armed forces and the people were preparing for a “vile enemy” about to invade the homeland:
One survivor relates his epiphany on the necessity to gladly accept his mission:
I could easily picture this scene in the Phillipines as the first Special Attack Unit waits for the command to go:
The author seems to take liberties in creating a narrative of the establishment of the first Shinpu Special Attack Unit. Vice Admiral Onishi is tasked to set up the unit. Is the author making up this soliloquy in the mind of Onishi or is it founded on fact? Don’t know but it reads well:
The author makes the book interesting to read, even if this passage seems a bit over the top:
Even the more radical and fanatical leaders in high command realized the Japanese people would not necessarily support the kamikaze strategy. They would need a hero to lead the way:
Onishi finds the “perfect” leader for the first Special Attack Unit. Lieutenant Yukio Seki will be the man who crashes into the St. Lo escort carrier, sending it to the bottom of the sea off Savo Island:
An excellent book from another perspective on the closing battles of WWII in the Pacific.
The armed forces and the people were preparing for a “vile enemy” about to invade the homeland:
One survivor relates his epiphany on the necessity to gladly accept his mission:
I could easily picture this scene in the Phillipines as the first Special Attack Unit waits for the command to go:
The author seems to take liberties in creating a narrative of the establishment of the first Shinpu Special Attack Unit. Vice Admiral Onishi is tasked to set up the unit. Is the author making up this soliloquy in the mind of Onishi or is it founded on fact? Don’t know but it reads well:
The author makes the book interesting to read, even if this passage seems a bit over the top:
Even the more radical and fanatical leaders in high command realized the Japanese people would not necessarily support the kamikaze strategy. They would need a hero to lead the way:
Onishi finds the “perfect” leader for the first Special Attack Unit. Lieutenant Yukio Seki will be the man who crashes into the St. Lo escort carrier, sending it to the bottom of the sea off Savo Island:
An excellent book from another perspective on the closing battles of WWII in the Pacific.
March 11, 2015
First of all, let’s say that this is really a 4 1/2 star review, not a 4-star review. The half star is lost as a result of my personal prejudice against the sort of history that writes “Francis Drake walked down the Plymouth street, stroking his beard, and his jewelled sword hilt sparkling in the summer sun” - in other words, writing history as a novel, and filling in sentences with unverifiable (but eminently plausible) details. Sheftall does this sometimes when describing some historical events where the information came from secondary sources.
For the most part, though, this book is based on primary sources; Sheftall’s interviews with those who lived through the times he is describing, and we can assume that when he writes a description, this is based on the actual memories of the interviewee.
I am in awe of this Studs Terkel-like approach, for two reasons. Firstly, from a purely linguistic basis. Sheftall conducted all these interviews in a notoriously “difficult” foreign language, which has undergone many changes since the time when the events described took place. Terms and nuances in use in the period described may be almost incomprehensible, even to native speakers of today’s Japanese. Secondly, he was interviewing a somewhat secretive group of people, carrying an enormous burden of emotional and cultural baggage, whom one might expect to act defensively towards any outsider, let alone a foreigner from a country with whom they were at war.
The fact that Sheftall not only managed to penetrate this thick shell, but also managed to extract some genuine responses, is a matter for praise of the highest kind. It undoubtedly helped (as he mentions at one point) that he is a graduate of West Point, and the fact that he is an alumnus of an élite military establishment helped to form a bond with these extraordinary people.
The personal stories read very smoothly indeed, and though it is not necessary to have a background knowledge of Japanese culture and language to appreciate the finer details of the “plot”, I definitely felt that it helped me understand a little more. Again, kudos to Sheftall for introducing an alien culture to his readers without condescension or obscurity.
So... now to the content. Most perceptions of tokkō (the suicide tactics) seem to regard the “suicide pilots” as either hapless unwilling dupes driven to their deaths by REMFs of the worst kind, or as fanatic Emperor-worshippers screaming “Banzai” as they rode their death-chariots to certain flaming oblivion. The truth, if we are to believe the survivors, is much more complex.
Sheftall has explored the psychology of wartime Japan in some depth. Certainly there is some truth in some of the stereotypes, but other factors, such as family loyalty, peer pressure, and simple military discipline, also played a part, and Sheftall displays an understanding of these motives that can only have come from the convictions expressed by those whom he interviewed for this book.
A sidenote: as a (non-military) Briton, it has always struck me how reluctant American armed forces are to accept fatalities in battle. The figures for American deaths in the American War in Viet Nam, or the recent Iraqi invasion, for example, are almost grotesquely disproportionate to the numbers of deaths experienced by their adversaries, and even to the numbers for “collateral damage” caused by the fighting. It may be that, since the USA bore the brunt of the Pacific War, and certainly US forces suffered most from the Japanese suicide attacks, this reluctance may be a key factor in the global judgement and condemnation of the tokkō tactics.
Certainly, Soviet forces, while not employing deliberate suicide tactics, were willing to risk much heavier casualty rates than the US, and even the British accepted very high death rates in units such as the RAF fighter squadrons in the Battle of Britain (the “tally ho!” mentality of going up against overwhelming odds was prevalent). In these three cases, Japan, the USSR, and the UK, the home country was in danger of invasion and occupation, where the USA was never under such threat.
In any event, Sheftall makes it perfectly credible to the reader that an intelligent young man, with his life before him, could willingly strap himself into a plane that he was barely capable of flying, with the confident hope that he would never return. Though he does not praise the tactics or the philosophy behind it, the kamikaze become much more intelligible as the result of his interpretation.
The end of the book is perhaps the most disturbing in some ways, as he examines the attitudes of the survivors of these units towards today’s Japan, which they regard as having been emasculated by the American victors. Again, we (most Japanese and foreign residents of Japan) are “expected” to loathe and detest the black sound trucks that make the streets hideous, and I am sure that Sheftall does not agree with all the rants that spew from these people. However, he does go a long way to explaining why these views exist, and it is far from being a mindless “my country right or wrong” or a misplaced sentimentality for the comradeship of men at war. For this insight alone, he deserves praise.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to know more about Japan, not just the Japan of then, but also that of today. Though no-one can describe any society with 100 percent accuracy, and perhaps Japanese society is more indescribable than any other, this book makes perfect sense to me, and crystallises many thoughts that have been lurking at the back of my mind.
For the most part, though, this book is based on primary sources; Sheftall’s interviews with those who lived through the times he is describing, and we can assume that when he writes a description, this is based on the actual memories of the interviewee.
I am in awe of this Studs Terkel-like approach, for two reasons. Firstly, from a purely linguistic basis. Sheftall conducted all these interviews in a notoriously “difficult” foreign language, which has undergone many changes since the time when the events described took place. Terms and nuances in use in the period described may be almost incomprehensible, even to native speakers of today’s Japanese. Secondly, he was interviewing a somewhat secretive group of people, carrying an enormous burden of emotional and cultural baggage, whom one might expect to act defensively towards any outsider, let alone a foreigner from a country with whom they were at war.
The fact that Sheftall not only managed to penetrate this thick shell, but also managed to extract some genuine responses, is a matter for praise of the highest kind. It undoubtedly helped (as he mentions at one point) that he is a graduate of West Point, and the fact that he is an alumnus of an élite military establishment helped to form a bond with these extraordinary people.
The personal stories read very smoothly indeed, and though it is not necessary to have a background knowledge of Japanese culture and language to appreciate the finer details of the “plot”, I definitely felt that it helped me understand a little more. Again, kudos to Sheftall for introducing an alien culture to his readers without condescension or obscurity.
So... now to the content. Most perceptions of tokkō (the suicide tactics) seem to regard the “suicide pilots” as either hapless unwilling dupes driven to their deaths by REMFs of the worst kind, or as fanatic Emperor-worshippers screaming “Banzai” as they rode their death-chariots to certain flaming oblivion. The truth, if we are to believe the survivors, is much more complex.
Sheftall has explored the psychology of wartime Japan in some depth. Certainly there is some truth in some of the stereotypes, but other factors, such as family loyalty, peer pressure, and simple military discipline, also played a part, and Sheftall displays an understanding of these motives that can only have come from the convictions expressed by those whom he interviewed for this book.
A sidenote: as a (non-military) Briton, it has always struck me how reluctant American armed forces are to accept fatalities in battle. The figures for American deaths in the American War in Viet Nam, or the recent Iraqi invasion, for example, are almost grotesquely disproportionate to the numbers of deaths experienced by their adversaries, and even to the numbers for “collateral damage” caused by the fighting. It may be that, since the USA bore the brunt of the Pacific War, and certainly US forces suffered most from the Japanese suicide attacks, this reluctance may be a key factor in the global judgement and condemnation of the tokkō tactics.
Certainly, Soviet forces, while not employing deliberate suicide tactics, were willing to risk much heavier casualty rates than the US, and even the British accepted very high death rates in units such as the RAF fighter squadrons in the Battle of Britain (the “tally ho!” mentality of going up against overwhelming odds was prevalent). In these three cases, Japan, the USSR, and the UK, the home country was in danger of invasion and occupation, where the USA was never under such threat.
In any event, Sheftall makes it perfectly credible to the reader that an intelligent young man, with his life before him, could willingly strap himself into a plane that he was barely capable of flying, with the confident hope that he would never return. Though he does not praise the tactics or the philosophy behind it, the kamikaze become much more intelligible as the result of his interpretation.
The end of the book is perhaps the most disturbing in some ways, as he examines the attitudes of the survivors of these units towards today’s Japan, which they regard as having been emasculated by the American victors. Again, we (most Japanese and foreign residents of Japan) are “expected” to loathe and detest the black sound trucks that make the streets hideous, and I am sure that Sheftall does not agree with all the rants that spew from these people. However, he does go a long way to explaining why these views exist, and it is far from being a mindless “my country right or wrong” or a misplaced sentimentality for the comradeship of men at war. For this insight alone, he deserves praise.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to know more about Japan, not just the Japan of then, but also that of today. Though no-one can describe any society with 100 percent accuracy, and perhaps Japanese society is more indescribable than any other, this book makes perfect sense to me, and crystallises many thoughts that have been lurking at the back of my mind.
August 29, 2013
Professor Sheftall immersed himself in the world of the surviving Japanese kamikaze pilots 60 years after that nation's surrender, to find the answer to a simple question: why did they train to expend their lives in attacks on the advancing American and British forces?
This book is the lucid, attentive, and sympathetic result of his research, and it defines these aging warriors clearly and accurately. Professor Sheftall had several competitive edges...he has lived in Japan for decades, speaks the language fluently, teaches in a Japanese university, and gained his academic credentials by studying their culture. He put these to work in writing this book.
Interestingly, the book also addresses a topic that makes it relevant to generations 70 years later: the comparison of Japan's Kamikaze pilots to the modern Muslim suicide terrorists, like those who attacked America on 9/11.
Professor Sheftall argues that the Kamikaze pilots saw themselves not as the suicide bombers...but as the firefighters who ran into the World Trade Center and perished in their destruction. This may seem odd, but the analogy is that the Kamikaze pilots were uniformed and serving members of the constituent armed forces of a sovereign nation, flying clearly-marked military aircraft, shedding their lives to attack legitimate military targets of another constituent sovereign nation, whose armed forces were driving toward the Japanese homeland. Only the actual kamikazes and the uniformed service members on the ships were at risk of death. If a uniformed service member of a sovereign nation tries to destroy an enemy aircraft carrier or assault transport by crashing his plane or torpedo into its hull, he is undertaking a lawful act of war.
The terrorists of 9/11, by comparison, did NOT represent any constituent nation or armed force. They wore no uniform. Their weapons were not clearly-marked aircraft of their air force, but illegally hijacked civilian airliners, loaded with noncombatant civilians. The terrorists slaughtered the civilian flight crews of these planes, took them over, and smashed them into civilian targets at the World Trade Center, and were prevented from hitting another civilian target by the passengers of Flight 93. The fourth target, the Pentagon, could be argued as a military target, but I won't go there. All civilians in the four planes perished in the attacks, as did vast numbers of civilians and emergency response workers on the ground. The goal of the 9/11 attacks was not to forestall a military advance. The attacks of 9/11 were not an act of war...they were acts of terror.
Consequently, the kamikazes of World War II are very different from terrorists of 9/11. The surviving Kamikaze pilots are very aware of this. They see themselves as being willing to expend their lives to save their beloved homeland of Japan from invasion by America and its allies.
The fact that Japan had launched the war on the United States and its allies without declaration of war, attacking American, British, and Dutch possessions, and proceeded to massacre civilians and prisoners, mistreat and starve PoWs, conduct biological warfare experiments on civilians, and ruthlessly loot occupied territories didn't change the kamikazes' situation...neither they nor their leadership, having started the war, were going to simply surrender -- particularly in a culture that regarded surrender as an abomination. The war was going on, the war was going badly, the war had to be fought, and if young men had to give their lives to keep the invader off the sacred soil of Japan, so be it.
So the Kamikazes saw themselves as giving their lives to save their nation, and analogized themselves to firefighters running up the stairs at the World Trade Center to save the people of their nation. Neither succeeded.
Professor Sheftall has done his research and his homework, and is familiar with the ground of his subject. His writing style is clear and powerful. He conveys both the atmosphere and attitudes of the young pilots of 1945 and the aging men of 2002.
My major negative criticism of this work is that he gets far too close to his subject, to the point of identifying with them, attending their events as an honored guest, becoming their ambassador and mouthpiece to the Western world and future generations.
I can understand writers becoming close to their subjects and identifying with them, but I have some difficulty identifying myself or sympathizing with the kamikaze pilots. Yes, they were patriotic. Yes, they were brave. Yes, they upheld their culture. Yes, they followed the laws and rules of war, as humanity tries to codify that insanity.
However, I cannot sympathize too much with the Kamikaze pilots because I cannot help but forget that their cause, while patriotic and heroic, was not just a "bad" cause...it was an evil one.
As I write this, I have at hand several books on the ordeal of the American, British, Australian, Canadian, Dutch, Indian, and New Zealand PoWs under the Japanese. Mistreating them is not the word. Horrific barbarity is a more appropriate term. The Japanese did not hesitate to starve, behead, and ruthlessly exploit their PoWs, building airfields, laboring in shipyards and coal mines, and, of course, constructing the vile "Railway of Death" in Thailand and Burma.
The Japanese also used their PoWs for the biological warfare experiments at Harbin (as mentioned), conducted sadistic medical experiments on them (some while alive), and even practiced cannibalism, as depicted in Mark Bradley's "Flyboys."
This is not a heroic cause. This is not the behavior of a civilized nation. There is nothing honorable in fighting for leadership that endorses, empowers, and enforces such policies.
In addition, the Japanese were not fighting to liberate Asia, as their propaganda claims...they sought to replace Western colonialism with a new form of slavery. Asian women were hauled off as "comfort girls," raped and flung into prostitution to entertain Japanese troops. Asian civilians were dragooned into the "Death Railway" alongside the PoWs, when PoW labor was in short supply. The Japanese cold-bloodedly butchered hundreds of thousands of residents of Nanking upon its conquest (and have denied doing so ever since), and conducted more biological warfare experiments on civilians. They also financed their war effort by turning hundreds of thousands of Manchurians and Chinese into opium addicts.
Consequently, while I can respect the situation of the Kamikaze pilots, I find it difficult to sympathize with them. They fought for a bad cause.
That being said, however, Professor Sheftall's book is probably the definitive work on this subject, which deserves greater readership in the West. Most of our accounts of the battles with the Kamikaze come from the Americans and British who endured the attacks -- we have virtually none from the Japanese side, for obvious reasons.
In an age when suicide bombing is increasingly becoming a normal means of communication for people and organizations with penknives to grind, ranging from Al Qaeda in New York and Washington to Adam Lanza in Connecticut, it is important that we understand why human beings would find it not only necessary, but desirable to deliberately train to and commit attacks that will take their lives.
Granted that the Japanese Kamikaze pilots are different psychologically from the suicide bombers of today, there are still important lessons we will learn from reading Professor Sheftall's book. The modern suicide bomber is often a displaced and desperate young man, who is covering his hopelessness and despair with an act of bravado, believing that his death will make him a posthumous inspiration and martyr for his cause.
That seems to be a common thread with terrorists and extreme radicals of many nations, cultures, and ideologies. I have noticed such behaviors and views in the lives and writings of neo-Nazis and the Symbionese Liberation Army. Both of them prattled about dying in battle against their ill-defined but massive enemies, and becoming statues in every town. Even Joseph Goebbels told his aides, in the Third Reich's final days, about how they should bear up so that people did not "hoot and whitle" when they appeared on screen. There are threads of commonality to suicide bombers and radicalism, and the Kamikaze corps, while not being a manifestation of radicalism, is an exemplar of that commonality at some levels. They should be studied.
It is tragic that we do not study history enough...only from Barbara Tuchman's "lantern on the stern" can we determine the direction of the waves before us. It is appalling that more people know about Kim Kardashian than Henry Clay, Snooki than Otto von Bismarck, and about "twerking" than the "Middle Passage." It amused me that the number one Internet search after 9/11 was "Nostradamus," as if that medieval poet and astrologer could predict the weather, let alone the future.
Perhaps George Orwell was right..."Who controls the present, controls the past. Who controls the past, controls the future."
Full disclosure: Professor Sheftall and I are high school classmates. We had the same writing teachers. We were not friends then, and we are absolutely NOT friends in any way now. Professor Sheftall has openly and privately stated his disdain and dislike of me as recently as 2003, ridiculed and attacked me, my character, and my writing, and publicly demanded that I be "silenced forever." Nor did I purchase the book. I read it in bookstores, doing so carefully, and put it back on the shelf.
I have reviewed this book purely as a professional journalist, part-time historian, and holder of an MFA in Creative Writing from the New School for Social Research, one of the nation's most prestigious such programs. (That and $2.50 gets me a ride on the New York Subway) Regardless of my personal feelings for Professor Sheftall and his for me, I am not going to let them impact on my views on his writing.
The book is outstanding, and a definitive work on the subject. I hope that he is able to produce a follow-on work, interviewing other Japanese World War II service members, before they die, and look forward to its success. That being said, I would not let him enter my home.
This book is the lucid, attentive, and sympathetic result of his research, and it defines these aging warriors clearly and accurately. Professor Sheftall had several competitive edges...he has lived in Japan for decades, speaks the language fluently, teaches in a Japanese university, and gained his academic credentials by studying their culture. He put these to work in writing this book.
Interestingly, the book also addresses a topic that makes it relevant to generations 70 years later: the comparison of Japan's Kamikaze pilots to the modern Muslim suicide terrorists, like those who attacked America on 9/11.
Professor Sheftall argues that the Kamikaze pilots saw themselves not as the suicide bombers...but as the firefighters who ran into the World Trade Center and perished in their destruction. This may seem odd, but the analogy is that the Kamikaze pilots were uniformed and serving members of the constituent armed forces of a sovereign nation, flying clearly-marked military aircraft, shedding their lives to attack legitimate military targets of another constituent sovereign nation, whose armed forces were driving toward the Japanese homeland. Only the actual kamikazes and the uniformed service members on the ships were at risk of death. If a uniformed service member of a sovereign nation tries to destroy an enemy aircraft carrier or assault transport by crashing his plane or torpedo into its hull, he is undertaking a lawful act of war.
The terrorists of 9/11, by comparison, did NOT represent any constituent nation or armed force. They wore no uniform. Their weapons were not clearly-marked aircraft of their air force, but illegally hijacked civilian airliners, loaded with noncombatant civilians. The terrorists slaughtered the civilian flight crews of these planes, took them over, and smashed them into civilian targets at the World Trade Center, and were prevented from hitting another civilian target by the passengers of Flight 93. The fourth target, the Pentagon, could be argued as a military target, but I won't go there. All civilians in the four planes perished in the attacks, as did vast numbers of civilians and emergency response workers on the ground. The goal of the 9/11 attacks was not to forestall a military advance. The attacks of 9/11 were not an act of war...they were acts of terror.
Consequently, the kamikazes of World War II are very different from terrorists of 9/11. The surviving Kamikaze pilots are very aware of this. They see themselves as being willing to expend their lives to save their beloved homeland of Japan from invasion by America and its allies.
The fact that Japan had launched the war on the United States and its allies without declaration of war, attacking American, British, and Dutch possessions, and proceeded to massacre civilians and prisoners, mistreat and starve PoWs, conduct biological warfare experiments on civilians, and ruthlessly loot occupied territories didn't change the kamikazes' situation...neither they nor their leadership, having started the war, were going to simply surrender -- particularly in a culture that regarded surrender as an abomination. The war was going on, the war was going badly, the war had to be fought, and if young men had to give their lives to keep the invader off the sacred soil of Japan, so be it.
So the Kamikazes saw themselves as giving their lives to save their nation, and analogized themselves to firefighters running up the stairs at the World Trade Center to save the people of their nation. Neither succeeded.
Professor Sheftall has done his research and his homework, and is familiar with the ground of his subject. His writing style is clear and powerful. He conveys both the atmosphere and attitudes of the young pilots of 1945 and the aging men of 2002.
My major negative criticism of this work is that he gets far too close to his subject, to the point of identifying with them, attending their events as an honored guest, becoming their ambassador and mouthpiece to the Western world and future generations.
I can understand writers becoming close to their subjects and identifying with them, but I have some difficulty identifying myself or sympathizing with the kamikaze pilots. Yes, they were patriotic. Yes, they were brave. Yes, they upheld their culture. Yes, they followed the laws and rules of war, as humanity tries to codify that insanity.
However, I cannot sympathize too much with the Kamikaze pilots because I cannot help but forget that their cause, while patriotic and heroic, was not just a "bad" cause...it was an evil one.
As I write this, I have at hand several books on the ordeal of the American, British, Australian, Canadian, Dutch, Indian, and New Zealand PoWs under the Japanese. Mistreating them is not the word. Horrific barbarity is a more appropriate term. The Japanese did not hesitate to starve, behead, and ruthlessly exploit their PoWs, building airfields, laboring in shipyards and coal mines, and, of course, constructing the vile "Railway of Death" in Thailand and Burma.
The Japanese also used their PoWs for the biological warfare experiments at Harbin (as mentioned), conducted sadistic medical experiments on them (some while alive), and even practiced cannibalism, as depicted in Mark Bradley's "Flyboys."
This is not a heroic cause. This is not the behavior of a civilized nation. There is nothing honorable in fighting for leadership that endorses, empowers, and enforces such policies.
In addition, the Japanese were not fighting to liberate Asia, as their propaganda claims...they sought to replace Western colonialism with a new form of slavery. Asian women were hauled off as "comfort girls," raped and flung into prostitution to entertain Japanese troops. Asian civilians were dragooned into the "Death Railway" alongside the PoWs, when PoW labor was in short supply. The Japanese cold-bloodedly butchered hundreds of thousands of residents of Nanking upon its conquest (and have denied doing so ever since), and conducted more biological warfare experiments on civilians. They also financed their war effort by turning hundreds of thousands of Manchurians and Chinese into opium addicts.
Consequently, while I can respect the situation of the Kamikaze pilots, I find it difficult to sympathize with them. They fought for a bad cause.
That being said, however, Professor Sheftall's book is probably the definitive work on this subject, which deserves greater readership in the West. Most of our accounts of the battles with the Kamikaze come from the Americans and British who endured the attacks -- we have virtually none from the Japanese side, for obvious reasons.
In an age when suicide bombing is increasingly becoming a normal means of communication for people and organizations with penknives to grind, ranging from Al Qaeda in New York and Washington to Adam Lanza in Connecticut, it is important that we understand why human beings would find it not only necessary, but desirable to deliberately train to and commit attacks that will take their lives.
Granted that the Japanese Kamikaze pilots are different psychologically from the suicide bombers of today, there are still important lessons we will learn from reading Professor Sheftall's book. The modern suicide bomber is often a displaced and desperate young man, who is covering his hopelessness and despair with an act of bravado, believing that his death will make him a posthumous inspiration and martyr for his cause.
That seems to be a common thread with terrorists and extreme radicals of many nations, cultures, and ideologies. I have noticed such behaviors and views in the lives and writings of neo-Nazis and the Symbionese Liberation Army. Both of them prattled about dying in battle against their ill-defined but massive enemies, and becoming statues in every town. Even Joseph Goebbels told his aides, in the Third Reich's final days, about how they should bear up so that people did not "hoot and whitle" when they appeared on screen. There are threads of commonality to suicide bombers and radicalism, and the Kamikaze corps, while not being a manifestation of radicalism, is an exemplar of that commonality at some levels. They should be studied.
It is tragic that we do not study history enough...only from Barbara Tuchman's "lantern on the stern" can we determine the direction of the waves before us. It is appalling that more people know about Kim Kardashian than Henry Clay, Snooki than Otto von Bismarck, and about "twerking" than the "Middle Passage." It amused me that the number one Internet search after 9/11 was "Nostradamus," as if that medieval poet and astrologer could predict the weather, let alone the future.
Perhaps George Orwell was right..."Who controls the present, controls the past. Who controls the past, controls the future."
Full disclosure: Professor Sheftall and I are high school classmates. We had the same writing teachers. We were not friends then, and we are absolutely NOT friends in any way now. Professor Sheftall has openly and privately stated his disdain and dislike of me as recently as 2003, ridiculed and attacked me, my character, and my writing, and publicly demanded that I be "silenced forever." Nor did I purchase the book. I read it in bookstores, doing so carefully, and put it back on the shelf.
I have reviewed this book purely as a professional journalist, part-time historian, and holder of an MFA in Creative Writing from the New School for Social Research, one of the nation's most prestigious such programs. (That and $2.50 gets me a ride on the New York Subway) Regardless of my personal feelings for Professor Sheftall and his for me, I am not going to let them impact on my views on his writing.
The book is outstanding, and a definitive work on the subject. I hope that he is able to produce a follow-on work, interviewing other Japanese World War II service members, before they die, and look forward to its success. That being said, I would not let him enter my home.
February 1, 2023
I have to give this a five star rating simply for the amount of research and care that went into this book. It reads smoothly and well--and can almost function as a book on the Japanese culture and mindset of the earlier Showa Era.
The author has a thorough understanding of the mindset of the Japanese soldier. He sees it as almost noble. Indeed like the cherry blossoms, there is something very beautiful here. Whether or not you agree that love for one's country is a good or bad thing, you can admire the kind of character it took to make the decision that these young men did. But was it youth, brainwashing, culture, stupidity, bravery, or something else? I don't think we can really decide that. What we can admire is the determination and resolution to follow one's convictions (be they right or wrong) and make the ultimate sacrifice. And that is what the author has captured here.
What is really amazing is how these men and women opened up to the author and were willing to tell their stories. But for the most part, the Japanese don't seem to hold any grudges against their former enemy. There is a realization that Occupation could have been far worse.
As someone who lived in Japan for 13 years and married into the culture, I found this to be an absolutely fascinating read. Admittedly I skimmed over some of the aircraft details. For the reader truly interested in the aircrafts and piloting of them, this will be a true gem. For the rest of us, it is another viewpoint on an aspect of Japanese culture that may be gone or still lurking under the surface.
Thank you to NetGalley for an advance copy of this book. I learned a lot!
The author has a thorough understanding of the mindset of the Japanese soldier. He sees it as almost noble. Indeed like the cherry blossoms, there is something very beautiful here. Whether or not you agree that love for one's country is a good or bad thing, you can admire the kind of character it took to make the decision that these young men did. But was it youth, brainwashing, culture, stupidity, bravery, or something else? I don't think we can really decide that. What we can admire is the determination and resolution to follow one's convictions (be they right or wrong) and make the ultimate sacrifice. And that is what the author has captured here.
What is really amazing is how these men and women opened up to the author and were willing to tell their stories. But for the most part, the Japanese don't seem to hold any grudges against their former enemy. There is a realization that Occupation could have been far worse.
As someone who lived in Japan for 13 years and married into the culture, I found this to be an absolutely fascinating read. Admittedly I skimmed over some of the aircraft details. For the reader truly interested in the aircrafts and piloting of them, this will be a true gem. For the rest of us, it is another viewpoint on an aspect of Japanese culture that may be gone or still lurking under the surface.
Thank you to NetGalley for an advance copy of this book. I learned a lot!
December 22, 2009
This is a four-star book.
But I had to take off three stars because the author did something unforgivable: like a Hollywood hack writing about a serial killer, he fell in love with his subjects.
However, the surviving Kamikazes and families of kamikazes do give extremely frank and honest accounts, and they probably wouldn't have opened their dark hearts had the author not loved them so unconditionally, so I'll give back one star.
Furthermore, his admiration for his subjects gives him a very strong identification with them. You get the impression he would very much have liked to be a kamikaze. Getting inside their minds like that, while distasteful, allows him to tell their stories effectively, so he gets another star back.
That makes three stars, although it really is a four-star book.
But I had to take off three stars because the author did something unforgivable: like a Hollywood hack writing about a serial killer, he fell in love with his subjects.
However, the surviving Kamikazes and families of kamikazes do give extremely frank and honest accounts, and they probably wouldn't have opened their dark hearts had the author not loved them so unconditionally, so I'll give back one star.
Furthermore, his admiration for his subjects gives him a very strong identification with them. You get the impression he would very much have liked to be a kamikaze. Getting inside their minds like that, while distasteful, allows him to tell their stories effectively, so he gets another star back.
That makes three stars, although it really is a four-star book.
February 12, 2023
I liked how this book combined personal reflection with personal scholarship. I thought that this would be more of an analytical book than a narrative history, and as I dug in, I realized that it would be just as capitvating as reading someone's academic argument about why men became suicide bombers.
I found it interesting how the first edition was written in 2002, shortly after religious extremists crashed planes into American buildings and landscape on September 11. That fact guided me as I read the author's uncovering of the stories behind some of the men who gave their lives.
While I never think destruction and death, especially in this context, should never be glorified, I found the book a great exercise in intellectual and historical humility. A country whose way of life and sheer existence seemed to be under threat, men who flew kamikaze missions certainly didn't see themselves as crazed militants bent on destroying as many lives as they could. It might be said that no matter what the situation, we can learn a lot more by looking objectively at the other side, to understand how it was seen from the enemy's view. I'm not advocating that they should be empathized with, nor am I saying what they did was noble- I wouldn't say this about any group, period, but I think it helps us understand the objective nature of the struggle being faced by both sides in World War II. It helps us not simply castigate the enemy as monsters bent on taking lives for the sake of it. After all, would we think it fair if the same view was taken by Japanese about the atomic bomb? Undoubtedly, there are many Americans who do, but after reading this book, perhaps we may be more willing to adjust our judgements
I found it interesting how the first edition was written in 2002, shortly after religious extremists crashed planes into American buildings and landscape on September 11. That fact guided me as I read the author's uncovering of the stories behind some of the men who gave their lives.
While I never think destruction and death, especially in this context, should never be glorified, I found the book a great exercise in intellectual and historical humility. A country whose way of life and sheer existence seemed to be under threat, men who flew kamikaze missions certainly didn't see themselves as crazed militants bent on destroying as many lives as they could. It might be said that no matter what the situation, we can learn a lot more by looking objectively at the other side, to understand how it was seen from the enemy's view. I'm not advocating that they should be empathized with, nor am I saying what they did was noble- I wouldn't say this about any group, period, but I think it helps us understand the objective nature of the struggle being faced by both sides in World War II. It helps us not simply castigate the enemy as monsters bent on taking lives for the sake of it. After all, would we think it fair if the same view was taken by Japanese about the atomic bomb? Undoubtedly, there are many Americans who do, but after reading this book, perhaps we may be more willing to adjust our judgements
January 6, 2014
The best part of this book is the 10 or so individual stories, mini-biographies really, in the book. The author interviewed most of these people in person and relates their stories pretty effectively.
I was afraid initially that some of this work was going to assume to much, and I think in the beginning some of his portrayals show that the author is writing into some of the characters more than he could know about their inner thoughts and attitudes of some of the people. Several people died before the author began writing so not comfortable with his deeply personal relation of their experience, motives, or thoughts.
If you are interested in getting into the heads of the people who volunteered for Air or Naval kamikaze duty the mini biographies in this book are the best way I've run across to get there.
The author points out that the surviving kamikaze volunteers veterans associations push a white washed version of the war to the younger generation of Japanese. One where they blame accounts of torture or war crimes on propganda and the lies of enimies. Many of these piolots were probably never around POWs like other members of the Japanese armed forces. But there are to many eye-witness acounts and evidence to excuse their white washing. The author notes it and does not point out this version of "correct" history is wrong though he stops short of agreeing with it.
I was afraid initially that some of this work was going to assume to much, and I think in the beginning some of his portrayals show that the author is writing into some of the characters more than he could know about their inner thoughts and attitudes of some of the people. Several people died before the author began writing so not comfortable with his deeply personal relation of their experience, motives, or thoughts.
If you are interested in getting into the heads of the people who volunteered for Air or Naval kamikaze duty the mini biographies in this book are the best way I've run across to get there.
The author points out that the surviving kamikaze volunteers veterans associations push a white washed version of the war to the younger generation of Japanese. One where they blame accounts of torture or war crimes on propganda and the lies of enimies. Many of these piolots were probably never around POWs like other members of the Japanese armed forces. But there are to many eye-witness acounts and evidence to excuse their white washing. The author notes it and does not point out this version of "correct" history is wrong though he stops short of agreeing with it.
February 18, 2021
Powerful stories of those in the Kamikaze ranks. It is something to see these were more from a sense of duty and trying to protect their country than a bunch of what we would call fanatics. The book tells of the pilots, a secret submarine and human torpedo group and showing some of the key battles. The book excels in uncovering the personal side of the war and shows how these were quite loyal warriors, but really were just young kids. The book also touches on some key political points of how Japan got into the wars and how many today don't understand their veterans. Another insight was how school girls got co opted into helping with these pilots and the terrible emotional toll it had on them knowing these pilots would go out and never come back. The book has interviews with some though who lived due to mechanical or engine failures or other circumstances that spared them from a certain death. I find it a bit ironic as it is really a mirror of what we see in the US and in our society as well. Hopefully we can all honor the warriors of our countries and remember how horrible war is so we can all work harder to keep peace.
January 11, 2021
The thirst for off beat WW II history brings me to choosing this book and I was extremely pleased. The history of kamikaze pilots and even Kamikaze torpedoes have never grasped my attention. This is a excellent history and personal stories of the people who wanted to save their country, the power of patriotism viewed from the "other side" and, as a last ditch effort, of the kamikazes or "Divine Wind". There was much at stake in the Pacific and the fighting was fiercer the closer the Allies came to Japan. The Japanese propaganda depicted Allies as brutes, rapists, and sociopath killers much like the way a Americans distrusted those of Japanese dissent and thought of by those back in the U.S.. The personal histories told have you feel each and every significance of Japan fostering last ditch tactics to save their own. Well worth the read with great incite!!!
August 7, 2025
This book was fascinating to me, because of its descriptions of the Japanese home front during and after World War II, his interviews of surviving Kamikaze pilots, and the legacy of defeat during WWII on the psyche of modern Japanese. I have some issues with this book, e.g. the pervasive use of acronyms without defining them, and the total lack of any photographs, even while he describes the numerous photo-journalists who captured images of these heroic men, But that aside, I still believe this is an important work that everyone interested in the history of the second world war should read. It is the very first book I have read that delved with what it was like to be living in Japan during WWII, and I thought it was an amazing story.
February 26, 2018
An absolutely stunning work. Not so much a comprehensive telling of the story of the Kamikaze, but rather a series of vignettes, telling individual tales of participants, siblings, and people who worked on bases. While some people might object to Sheftall's lack of condemnation of the program, the book seeks to understand those who participated on their own terms. A highly valuable addition to any collection on World War 2.
January 20, 2021
Learn the truth about the Kamikaze and the young men who sacrificed for their nation
An amazing look inside the life and culture of the kamikaze. The stories are from the survivors and they take you through the training, the political background, and the desperate conditions that gave birth to the divine wind, the feared weapons of a desperate nation.
An amazing look inside the life and culture of the kamikaze. The stories are from the survivors and they take you through the training, the political background, and the desperate conditions that gave birth to the divine wind, the feared weapons of a desperate nation.
December 25, 2023
An eye-opening and fascinating read. The portions discussing the kamikaze program with survivors and family members was truly impactful. The only knock I would give is that I could do without some of the authors personal views, particularly the classic ‘young people are weak’ views that pop up at points.
January 16, 2020
Excellent and well research story of kamikaze pilots in WW2. Interviews with surviving pilots gives an accurate picture of the mindset of the Japanese nation during the war. I recommend reading this along with Fly Boys.
Read
February 2, 2025I couldn't finish it.
January 28, 2016
This is an interesting and different sort of book on the subject. It's not written as a historical analysis. It does include some of that, of course, but it also includes a lot of personal memories from people actually involved in the kamikaze activities as interviewed by the author. The author's own impressions are given, and this makes the entire book a little more alive than most others of its general nature.
He addresses the origin of the kamikaze movement in WWII and notes that it actually had no precedent in Japanese history. There may have been isolated instances of kamikaze-like behavior, but no organized mass attack concepts as there were during the war. Public relations were also part of its origin, trying to convince people this was a glorious thing these men were doing.
He notes that some of the Japanese leaders did want to drive the white man out of Asia, and some were concerned about Japan not having enough natural resources to continue its war in China. As things went from bad to worse, Japan began to run out of military options. Nothing they did could seem to stop the inexorable movement of American forces closer and closer to the Japanese mainland. The Japanese Navy had been basically sunk and was no longer a major factor in the war effort.
He also writes about how, in the last part of the war, the quality control in production was so low that there was a major problem.
The author again goes into the PR importance of the kamikaze, a sort of trickle-down effect. If they succeeded, it would raise the morale of the military. As the common people heard about the successes, (which were often blown way out of proportion), then they would get excited and work harder for the war effort.
The Leyte Gulf battle had an effect on the growing support in the military for the kamikaze. In that battle the Japanese lost four aircraft carriers, three battleships (including the Musashi, the sister-ship of the Yamato), six heavy cruisers, four light cruisers, twelve destroyers, and four submarines. The main thing to keep in mind about this is that the Japanese could not afford to lose such numbers of ships since there was no way that they could replace them. The U.S. ship-building was capable of more than replacing ship losses, but the Japanese couldn't, so as one group would get stronger, the other would naturally get weaker and that's exactly what happened.
One of the great things the author does is detail the revisionist approach to history. The Japanese revisionists holds that Japan was threatened by the colonial powers, that they wanted to free Asia from whites and from the Soviet threat, the Nanking massacre and similar things didn't happen, and so on.
He goes into the daily lives of the kamikaze, showing the types of things they were doing in getting read for their own expected deaths.
The author also goes into the Oka flying bombs and how a lot of those ended up at the bottom of the ocean when ships carrying them were sunk by U.S. subs. The end result of the Oka program was one U.S. ship sunk and six damaged, with the loss of 375 Oka crewmen (counting the crew in the planes carrying the Oka to their launch point), and 55 Oka pilots.
An interesting point is that one of the pilots saw, while out walking, women training with bamboo spears. The Japanese government was going to use all the people they could to repel the expected U.S. invasion, even if they were almost untrained and had only bamboo spears to fight with.
(I think if that had happened it would have increased the hatred for the Japanese tremendously, “proving” to people in the U.S. that the Japanese were all totally fanatical, and the only thing to stop them was total annihilation. Killing Japanese civilians would have become as completely acceptable as killing their regular soldiers.)
There's also lots more in the book. This is one of the best, maybe the best book that examines the topic of the kamikaze, especially since it does so from so many different angles, including military, historical, psychological, sociological, and personal.
He addresses the origin of the kamikaze movement in WWII and notes that it actually had no precedent in Japanese history. There may have been isolated instances of kamikaze-like behavior, but no organized mass attack concepts as there were during the war. Public relations were also part of its origin, trying to convince people this was a glorious thing these men were doing.
He notes that some of the Japanese leaders did want to drive the white man out of Asia, and some were concerned about Japan not having enough natural resources to continue its war in China. As things went from bad to worse, Japan began to run out of military options. Nothing they did could seem to stop the inexorable movement of American forces closer and closer to the Japanese mainland. The Japanese Navy had been basically sunk and was no longer a major factor in the war effort.
He also writes about how, in the last part of the war, the quality control in production was so low that there was a major problem.
The author again goes into the PR importance of the kamikaze, a sort of trickle-down effect. If they succeeded, it would raise the morale of the military. As the common people heard about the successes, (which were often blown way out of proportion), then they would get excited and work harder for the war effort.
The Leyte Gulf battle had an effect on the growing support in the military for the kamikaze. In that battle the Japanese lost four aircraft carriers, three battleships (including the Musashi, the sister-ship of the Yamato), six heavy cruisers, four light cruisers, twelve destroyers, and four submarines. The main thing to keep in mind about this is that the Japanese could not afford to lose such numbers of ships since there was no way that they could replace them. The U.S. ship-building was capable of more than replacing ship losses, but the Japanese couldn't, so as one group would get stronger, the other would naturally get weaker and that's exactly what happened.
One of the great things the author does is detail the revisionist approach to history. The Japanese revisionists holds that Japan was threatened by the colonial powers, that they wanted to free Asia from whites and from the Soviet threat, the Nanking massacre and similar things didn't happen, and so on.
He goes into the daily lives of the kamikaze, showing the types of things they were doing in getting read for their own expected deaths.
The author also goes into the Oka flying bombs and how a lot of those ended up at the bottom of the ocean when ships carrying them were sunk by U.S. subs. The end result of the Oka program was one U.S. ship sunk and six damaged, with the loss of 375 Oka crewmen (counting the crew in the planes carrying the Oka to their launch point), and 55 Oka pilots.
An interesting point is that one of the pilots saw, while out walking, women training with bamboo spears. The Japanese government was going to use all the people they could to repel the expected U.S. invasion, even if they were almost untrained and had only bamboo spears to fight with.
(I think if that had happened it would have increased the hatred for the Japanese tremendously, “proving” to people in the U.S. that the Japanese were all totally fanatical, and the only thing to stop them was total annihilation. Killing Japanese civilians would have become as completely acceptable as killing their regular soldiers.)
There's also lots more in the book. This is one of the best, maybe the best book that examines the topic of the kamikaze, especially since it does so from so many different angles, including military, historical, psychological, sociological, and personal.
April 12, 2023
My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Penguin Group Dutton for an advanced copy of this history on World War II and the Japanese pilots who survived when they were not supposed to.
Desperate times call for drastic measures. That is what many a government official has told themselves as they make decisions that will lead to people dying. The nation of Japan was in desperate straits during the year of 1944. Ships were sinking, resources were stretched, and the Allied forces were closing in on the home islands. A decision was made that planes, fully loaded with explosives would be used to crash into American ships, carriers, tankers, and ships that were considered valuable to the war effort, using the resources that Japan still had. Human pilots. This kamikaze program sent hundreds of men, in older planes against the Allies, sinking many, and ending many American lives. However not all the men who were chosen died. During the shadow of 9/11 the question of what motivated suicide bombers was one that was asked alot by people. And M. G. Sheftall was interested in finding out. Blossoms in the Wind: Human Legacies of the Kamikaze is the story of those who remain, what they learned, and how their lives changed by living when asked by their governments to be human weapons.
After 9/11 M. G. Sheftall began a project that he hoped would illuminate on why people would choose to become suicide bomber by interviewing Japanese pilots from World War II. Sheftall spoke Japanese, had lived in Japan for many years and was familiar with the politics of Japan as well as the cultural views the military was viewed in Japan. Sheftall was given access to many of the reports dealing with the kamikaze, from its early beginnings to flight records and interviews with many of the pilots who survived. Pilots would have planes that wouldn't start, or crash on the way, as much of Japan's war machines were suffering from lack of decent fuel or parts. Many of this pilots have lived long lives, with business success, families, and in some cases an appreciation for life. Though they are haunted. Sheftall goes into the history that lead up to the war, and what the motivation was for suicide planes. Sheftall also talks to a group of woman whose jobs during the war was to take care of the barracks for pilots expected to die, seeing new pilots almost monthly, and what this did to them over the years.
There is a tremendous amount of research in this book, and Sheftall does a very good job of bringing this all together in a book that is far more than just a history book. There is a little bit of imagination in some conversations on the historical side, but this fills up gaps in the story so this is excusable. Everything else seems to be footnoted, and cross-checked. The stories about the men are the most interesting. Readers learn quite a bit about their lives before the war, and how they found themselves where they were. And what happened after. Planning to die with your friends, while stopping the Americans from destroying your home, your family, and suddenly the plant won't start. Or the gas makes the engine seize in midair. These men planned for death, and suddenly were alive. They are haunted about why them. Why did they live, and yet friends, colleagues, even idols, died sometimes succeeding, other times being shot down. Sheftall is very good at letting the men speak, and from this readers learn a lot. Some might say that Sheftall became too close to his subjects, which I can see. However one could see why.
A different history of World War II, one where great acts of courage were almost denied by the hand of fate. Reading this one does wonder why things happen the way they do. Thousands of men might be dying in a battle, boats sinking or on fire. And yet a plane doesn't start, a pilot gets lost in the system, and a man tasked to die is given a long life, and left with many questions. Not many history books leave one wondering about fate, this one does.
Desperate times call for drastic measures. That is what many a government official has told themselves as they make decisions that will lead to people dying. The nation of Japan was in desperate straits during the year of 1944. Ships were sinking, resources were stretched, and the Allied forces were closing in on the home islands. A decision was made that planes, fully loaded with explosives would be used to crash into American ships, carriers, tankers, and ships that were considered valuable to the war effort, using the resources that Japan still had. Human pilots. This kamikaze program sent hundreds of men, in older planes against the Allies, sinking many, and ending many American lives. However not all the men who were chosen died. During the shadow of 9/11 the question of what motivated suicide bombers was one that was asked alot by people. And M. G. Sheftall was interested in finding out. Blossoms in the Wind: Human Legacies of the Kamikaze is the story of those who remain, what they learned, and how their lives changed by living when asked by their governments to be human weapons.
After 9/11 M. G. Sheftall began a project that he hoped would illuminate on why people would choose to become suicide bomber by interviewing Japanese pilots from World War II. Sheftall spoke Japanese, had lived in Japan for many years and was familiar with the politics of Japan as well as the cultural views the military was viewed in Japan. Sheftall was given access to many of the reports dealing with the kamikaze, from its early beginnings to flight records and interviews with many of the pilots who survived. Pilots would have planes that wouldn't start, or crash on the way, as much of Japan's war machines were suffering from lack of decent fuel or parts. Many of this pilots have lived long lives, with business success, families, and in some cases an appreciation for life. Though they are haunted. Sheftall goes into the history that lead up to the war, and what the motivation was for suicide planes. Sheftall also talks to a group of woman whose jobs during the war was to take care of the barracks for pilots expected to die, seeing new pilots almost monthly, and what this did to them over the years.
There is a tremendous amount of research in this book, and Sheftall does a very good job of bringing this all together in a book that is far more than just a history book. There is a little bit of imagination in some conversations on the historical side, but this fills up gaps in the story so this is excusable. Everything else seems to be footnoted, and cross-checked. The stories about the men are the most interesting. Readers learn quite a bit about their lives before the war, and how they found themselves where they were. And what happened after. Planning to die with your friends, while stopping the Americans from destroying your home, your family, and suddenly the plant won't start. Or the gas makes the engine seize in midair. These men planned for death, and suddenly were alive. They are haunted about why them. Why did they live, and yet friends, colleagues, even idols, died sometimes succeeding, other times being shot down. Sheftall is very good at letting the men speak, and from this readers learn a lot. Some might say that Sheftall became too close to his subjects, which I can see. However one could see why.
A different history of World War II, one where great acts of courage were almost denied by the hand of fate. Reading this one does wonder why things happen the way they do. Thousands of men might be dying in a battle, boats sinking or on fire. And yet a plane doesn't start, a pilot gets lost in the system, and a man tasked to die is given a long life, and left with many questions. Not many history books leave one wondering about fate, this one does.
January 22, 2024
In some ways, M.G. Sheftall’s “Blossoms in the Wind: Human Legacies of the Kamikaze” reminded me of Barbara Demick’s excellent 2009 book, “Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea.”
Yes, the countries, eras and world events are different, but both books focus on Asian nations’ everyday populace amid extreme circumstances. Demick’s subjects are forced to navigate a surreally intrusive/controlling regime, while Sheftall’s exist in a war-torn country whose leaders are resorting to insanely desperate measures… with mostly public support.
Like “Nothing to Envy,” “Blossoms in the Wind” is most built on personal vignettes. Throw in ample World War II history from the Japanese perspective (especially its ever-fascinating final days), and the American author’s cutesy first-person narration (he’s no David Sedaris, but his attempts at cleverness aren’t wholly unwelcome; I smiled at a few. He also peppers the passages with movie references, from Japanese ones to “Patton” and “An Officer and a Gentleman”), and you’ve got an intriguing, atypical World War II book.
A strong 4/5.
P.S. The publication history of “Blossoms in the Wind” is confusing. It was originally published in 2005, and for some reason re-published by Penguin/Random House in 2023, inhabiting new-releases shelves as of a month ago… the way in which this most matters is that BitW was written in the wake of Sept. 11, 2001, which looms in the narrative, e.g., Sheftall addresses the temptation by some to equate the 9-11 terrorists and Japan’s World War II kamikazes.
Yes, the countries, eras and world events are different, but both books focus on Asian nations’ everyday populace amid extreme circumstances. Demick’s subjects are forced to navigate a surreally intrusive/controlling regime, while Sheftall’s exist in a war-torn country whose leaders are resorting to insanely desperate measures… with mostly public support.
Like “Nothing to Envy,” “Blossoms in the Wind” is most built on personal vignettes. Throw in ample World War II history from the Japanese perspective (especially its ever-fascinating final days), and the American author’s cutesy first-person narration (he’s no David Sedaris, but his attempts at cleverness aren’t wholly unwelcome; I smiled at a few. He also peppers the passages with movie references, from Japanese ones to “Patton” and “An Officer and a Gentleman”), and you’ve got an intriguing, atypical World War II book.
A strong 4/5.
P.S. The publication history of “Blossoms in the Wind” is confusing. It was originally published in 2005, and for some reason re-published by Penguin/Random House in 2023, inhabiting new-releases shelves as of a month ago… the way in which this most matters is that BitW was written in the wake of Sept. 11, 2001, which looms in the narrative, e.g., Sheftall addresses the temptation by some to equate the 9-11 terrorists and Japan’s World War II kamikazes.
March 9, 2011
I picked up this book hoping to learn about the history of the kamikaze program. However, it seems Sheftall's goal was to examine the mind of the young kamikazes and the culture that created the phenomenon. The end result was something between an historical account and a book on mid-twentieth century Japanese society. Sheftall told the story of the kamikazes through ten or so men and a group of women who lived through the kamikaze program. Although I found the historical information- such as the wide variety of kamikaze-specific vehicles including planes, gliders, speed boats, and torpedos- interesting, I now realize that the "why" behind the story was probably more interesting. In hindsight, I wish Sheftall had spend more time addressing the psychological propaganda put forth by the Japanese government and less time on the religious beliefs of the Japanese people. Though by no means an action-packed story, this book was an engaging read based almost entirely on firsthand accounts from men who expected to die more than 50 years before this book was published.
April 29, 2014
This is a must read for anyone interested in the Pacific War, Japanese culture or language. Sheftall's insight comes through like a bell in this book of firsthand interviews with Japanese men and women who experienced the war.
He introduces us to men who trained for kamikaze missions giving us a look at them as human beings and not the typical "crazed lunatics" they are often portrayed as in old movies. We also meet those who supported them and learn how they felt about the war.
I also read, write, and speak Japanese. In the past 25 years I have interviewed 97 Japanese WWII army and navy veterans so can say from experience that Sheftall knows his stuff.
He is also a gifted creative writer. This book is not a dry, boring textbook but reads like a suspense novel...and the best part is its all true.
This is one of my favorite books on the Pacific War.
He introduces us to men who trained for kamikaze missions giving us a look at them as human beings and not the typical "crazed lunatics" they are often portrayed as in old movies. We also meet those who supported them and learn how they felt about the war.
I also read, write, and speak Japanese. In the past 25 years I have interviewed 97 Japanese WWII army and navy veterans so can say from experience that Sheftall knows his stuff.
He is also a gifted creative writer. This book is not a dry, boring textbook but reads like a suspense novel...and the best part is its all true.
This is one of my favorite books on the Pacific War.
May 27, 2015
M.G.Sheftall has written an extremely well-researched narrative on the tokko pilots. Without judgement for the cause this men sacrificed for and were sacrificed for, Sheftall has put a human face to this terrifying weapon. These young man were pawns whose lives were expendiable but they believed in their cause and more importantly each other. Many parts of the book brought tears to my eyes and a lump in my throat. Most importantly, it brought about a new understanding. The narratives of these former-tokko pilots are important for the Japanese to know and for the worl to know. In an age where sucide bombers still exist, it is important to understand why someone would lay their life down in such a manner.
July 2, 2012
An excellent book considering the difficulties the author had in gaining the trust and confidence of the surviving kamikaze pilots in order to interview them and their families. That took time and a plunge into the murky world of Yasukuni, the shrine in Tokyo that memorialises the war dead of all Japanese conflicts from Meiji onwards but is particularly associated with the Great Asian War. M.G. ("Bucky") Sheftall works at a local university in the city we live in so an acquaintance with the author has led to a better understanding of the way this work was devised and put together.
January 16, 2016
An excellent read about the suicide pilots and human torpedoes of the Japanese army & navy in Big Two and the brass hats behind those operations. Puts the events in their social, cultural, political and military contexts and makes the psychology of the phenomenon completey understandable. Really helps bridge some of the vast gap between East and West and brings the few surviving pilots, torepedomen and their supporters right up close, ready to explain themselves. Really a breathtaking piece of work.
May 20, 2024
In order to understand how young Japanese men could 'volunteer' to deliberately fly a bomb-laden plane into a ship. Sheftall explored the culture extant in Japan before, during and near the end of WW-2. We read about the lives of some pilots who volunteered but were, for one reason or another, didn't die a fiery death. Instead, these men survived the war to become businessmen. Sheftall also explored the effect of these kamikaze deaths on the families the pilots left behind.
This is an in-depth study of Japanese culture and how it changed as a result of the war and these deaths.
This is an in-depth study of Japanese culture and how it changed as a result of the war and these deaths.
January 4, 2008
Really hard to get through because of the content, but it really gets into the mind of the Japanese during WWII.
May 12, 2012
Interesting look into the mind and mission of toko (special mission) pilots, we know them as kamikaze pilots.
May 17, 2014
Really well written... an enthralling look into an aspect of Japan that not many people have examined.
January 26, 2016
1/26/2016 IFPL
October 30, 2015
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