The Eternal Zero

by Naoki Hyakuta

  I was impressed anew by the Zero’s prowess. Or rather, I was impressed by the incredible skill of the men piloting the planes. “Each a match for a thousand,” as the expression goes.

  The battle continued intermittently for nearly two hours. Over forty torpedo bombers attacked us, but nearly every one of them was downed by the Zeros. Not a single torpedo struck us.

  * * *

  —

  The frantic reloading of the torpedoes continued inside the carrier the whole while. It was then that I heard a lookout scream. I’ll never forget the sound of that cry for as long as I live.

  I looked skyward to see four dive bombers descending upon us like demons. I stared up, engrossed by the demons, and thought despairingly, Oh hell, we’re done for. I saw the bombers release their ordnance. It was a mere moment, yet it unfolded as though in slow motion. Four bombs fell leisurely, laughing. The shrill sounds they gave off as they glided through the air sounded like demonic laughter. They must have been laughing at our carelessness and arrogance.

  The bombs exploded on the carrier deck with a thunderous roar. I was blown backwards into the bridge. Had it not been there I would have ended up in the sea.

  Half-unconscious, I stared at the burning deck. Aircraft were catching fire one after the other. Aircrew leapt out of the crafts covered in flames. Planes whose propellers were already spinning went out of control, spontaneously lurching forward, some crashing, others falling into the ocean. The deck was in chaos. Further explosions came one after another from the hangar, the torpedoes and bombs triggering thanks to the fire. Each blast rocked the massive ship. I looked starboard to see the Kaga aflame as well. Another aircraft carrier far astern was also burning. Three of our carriers had been taken out in a flash.

  I went down onto the afterdeck to escape the burning flight deck. A group of attack force crew was already there. Everyone’s faces were drawn. There were many who were injured. A large number had lost limbs. The floor was stained with vast amounts of blood. It was hellish pandemonium.

  Intermittent explosions echoed from the hangar. We ferried buckets of water to put out the fire, but it was like pouring water on a hot stone. Eventually we ran out of water and there was nothing left to be done.

  The flames on the ship blazed dozens of meters high and the smoke billowed hundreds of meters into the air. The entire ship was scorching hot. The metal ladders were hot enough to burn the soles of our boots. If you touched the handrail without thinking, you ended up with a serious burn. We found ourselves trapped on the afterdeck at a loss for what to do.

  It was then that we caught sight of the headquarters staff abandoning the ship from the carrier’s bow. Vice Admiral Nagumo and many of his officers were fleeing in launch boats. Seeing them left us crestfallen. Command had abandoned ship. The Akagi was done for.

  After a while a destroyer’s cutter drew close and came to our rescue. We boarded and left the Akagi behind. Once on board the cutter I turned back to gaze at the carrier. She was enveloped in a sea of flames so massive, it seemed like that was all the fire there could be in the world. The blaze was so intense that even at a distance of over a hundred meters I could still feel the heat waves.

  But the Akagi did not sink. Because she had been bombed, not torpedoed, the ship had burst into flames but wasn’t going down. But this merely prolonged her death throes, creating a hellish spectacle. Her steel went red and turned molten. Black smoke extended a full kilometer into the sky.

  Two other streams of black smoke rose upward. A total of three carriers were destroyed.

  I wept. The many other crewmembers aboard the cutter were crying, too.

  Above us Zeros flew in vain, having lost their homes. Miyabe must have been among them.

  * * *

  —

  That was the Battle of Midway as I experienced it. After the war, it gained infamy as the “five fateful minutes”: had we just five more minutes, they said, our entire attack force would have been launched, re-equipped; even if the carriers had been dive bombed, they’d not have sunk since no bombs on deck would have gone up in secondary explosions; our attack forces would have dealt the enemy a knockout and turned their carriers into fish food. Luck was simply not with us, the argument went.

  But that’s a lie. When the Americans’ dive bombers attacked, in actuality the reloading was still a long way off from being finished. I don’t know how much more time it would have taken, but it certainly wasn’t “five minutes.”

  There are no “ifs” or “buts” in history. The outcome of that battle was not due to bad luck. We could have launched our aircraft sooner if we’d wanted. We should have struck the enemy’s carriers first, be it with land bombs. It was our arrogance that prevented us from doing so.

  Also, the Americans’ torpedo bombers had arrived without any fighter planes. Bombers attacking without escort is sheer suicide, and our Zeros took all of them out. But in effect, they served as a decoy. Our CAP was distracted by the torpedo bombers and neglected to keep an eye on the skies. The dive bombers that came later broke through that gap and devastated us.

  Sure, you could call that bad luck, but I don’t believe that’s true. I learned this after the fact, but apparently, once the U.S. forces discovered our aircraft carriers, they sent out their attack planes as soon as each flight was ready even though the fighters couldn’t be deployed in time, just in order to strike us straightaway.

  When I imagine how the American torpedo bomber pilots must have felt, my chest swells with emotion. They surely understood what it meant to sortie without a fighter escort. They must have been well aware of the terror of confronting a Zero. There’s no doubt that they were prepared for the possibility that they would not come back alive. Yet they bravely departed all the same. They swooped down on our carriers and were gunned down in rapid succession by the Zeros. Their risky attack drew our carriers’ CAP into lower altitudes and prepared for the successful attack by the dive bombers.

  I think the true champions of the Battle of Midway may very well have been the U.S. torpedo bombers. Just as our recon plane crew, knowing they’d run out of fuel, led their comrades to the location of the enemy on the Coral Sea, the American torpedo pilots sacrificed themselves for the sake of winning the war.

  The Japanese weren’t the only ones who could give their lives to the nation. We had our justification, which was to serve the Emperor. Surely the Americans didn’t have the same sense of duty to their president. Then what were they fighting for? Purely for their country, I’d say.

  In fact, we Japanese weren’t risking our lives for the Emperor, either. For us, too, it was patriotism, the love of country.

  * * *

  —

  In that battle, Japan lost four irreplaceable carriers. The U.S. lost only one, the Yorktown, which had received major damage in the Battle of the Coral Sea. Admiral Nimitz had ordered emergency measures and had the carrier, wounded as she was, participate in the battle at Midway. She dealt a severe blow to our carrier force and then sank. Yankee Spirit.

  In comparison, the Zuikaku, which had emerged from Coral Sea unharmed, was merely resting back in Japan in the Seto Inland Sea—we had lost the Battle of Midway before it even began.

  There’s just one thing I want to praise our side for: the Hiryu, the only one of our four carriers to elude the enemy attack, putting up quite the fight. Led by the indomitable Rear Admiral Tamon Yamaguchi, commander of the Second Division, the Hiryu took on three American carriers all alone after our other three had been taken out. In the end, Hiryu and Yorktown died on each other’s swords. Rear Admiral Yamaguchi went down with the Hiryu. As it happened, Yamaguchi was strongly opposed to Fleet Commander Nagumo’s decision to unload the torpedoes and had advised an immediate launch of our attack forces. He’d also strongly recommended a third wave of attacks on Pearl Harbor.

  Lieutenant Joichi Tomonaga, attack force commander o
f the Hiryu, boldly sortied on a Type 97 attack bomber whose tank had been pierced. He only had enough fuel for a one-way trip.

  Had this been a sporting match, after the battle the crews of Yorktown and Hiryu might have praised each other for putting up a good fight, and perhaps friendship could have been forged between the two sides. But this was war. The two ships slaughtered each other, taking many lives along with them.

  According to one theory, the loss of so many seasoned pilots in the Battle of Midway was the biggest blow to the Imperial Navy, but that’s not quite true. Most of the aircrew aboard Hiryu, which fought to the end, did perish. But many of us on the three other carriers destroyed at the outset were rescued.

  It was at the Battle of Guadalcanal, which began that fall, that we lost droves of seasoned pilots.

  —What of Miyabe?

  He probably continued to fight until he ran out of fuel and then ditched in the ocean. Or maybe he landed on the Hiryu and took part in the conflict with Yorktown. In any case, he, too, made it back to the interior alive. We never met again, though. The last I saw of him was when he took off from the Akagi. I heard that after Midway he was transferred to Rabaul along with a great number of aircrew.

  My eyes were damaged in the bomb blast and my vision was reduced to 20:100, so I could no longer pilot a fighter. After I returned to Japan, I became an instructor for the Preparatory Flight Training Program. Had my eyes been fine, I probably would have been transferred from place to place, and I wouldn’t still be here today. In fact, many of the carrier aircrew stationed at Rabaul ended up perishing in the Solomon Sea.

  The Solomon Sea became an airmen’s graveyard. From the latter half of 1942, a notice of transfer to Rabaul was considered a one-way ticket.

  * * *

  —

  I heard that Miyabe survived for over a year in that hellish battlefield. Perhaps his cowardice is what allowed him to extend his lifespan. In the air, the brave are the first to fall. Miyabe was a different sort of man than Flight CPO Kanno, who gave up on ever returning in order to lead a friendly attack force to the enemy on the Coral Sea, or Lieutenant Tomonaga, who sortied at Midway knowing his mission would be one-way only. But Miyabe’s cowardice isn’t grounds for criticism.

  I will say this. His skills as a pilot were first rate. I’m a little embarrassed to say this myself, but during the war, being assigned to the First Carrier Division was proof that you were a first-rate pilot. That he survived the living hell that was Guadalcanal was also thanks to his skills as a pilot.

  * * *

  —

  The ice in the iced coffee set before me had long since melted. I had totally forgotten to even take a sip. Former Lt. JG Kanji Ito’s tale had overwhelmed me. I knew next to nothing about the War in the Pacific, so everything he said came as a shock.

  The battles may have taken place between aircraft carriers, but in the end it was humans fighting. The forces’ specs weren’t the only factor. Bravery, decisiveness, and cool judgment decided who won or lost, who lived or died.

  Still, what a cruel world it was for the soldiers. The battles had happened a mere sixty years ago. My grandfather had fought in them.

  According to Ito, my grandfather was not just a cowardly man but also a competent pilot. His words gave me a small amount of consolation.

  “So Miyabe died in a kamikaze attack?” Ito suddenly asked.

  “Yes, sir. In August 1945, off the southwestern islands.”

  “August, eh? Right before the war ended. So they forced pilots as experienced as Miyabe to kamikaze.”

  “Was it so rare for skilled pilots to become kamikazes?”

  “Most were student reservists or young airmen. The Army and Navy put them through brief training to hurl them at the enemy.” Ito looked pained. “I trained many student reservists myself. It took at least two years to turn someone into a full-fledged pilot, but those guys were given less than a year of flight training. The higher-ups probably thought that was sufficient for suicide attacks.”

  Tears shone in Ito’s eyes again.

  “That’s terrible,” I said.

  “It was. But tactically speaking, it was a waste to kill off a seasoned pilot in a single kamikaze mission. The experts were instead tasked with escorting the kamikazes to the enemy fleet and also with defending the skies over the mainland. But it was obvious in the final days of the war that we would be defeated. The mood was ‘all one hundred million fighting to the death’ and ‘all planes be kamikazes,’ so I guess even a veteran pilot like Miyabe was ordered to mount a ‘special attack’ as well.”

  For the first time I was able to understand, if only a little, the chagrin my grandfather must have felt. Forced to fight continuously from the Sino-Japanese war, then used and thrown away as a kamikaze. That must have been infuriating for someone who’d wanted so badly to return home alive.

  “Please tell me one more thing, if you can,” I said. “Did my grandfather say that he loved my grandmother?”

  Ito got a faraway look in his eyes. “He never said, ‘I love her.’ Our generation didn’t use the word. Miyabe was the same. What he said was that for his wife’s sake, he didn’t want to die.”

  I nodded.

  Ito concluded, “For our generation, that’s the same thing as saying, ‘I love her.’ ”

  Chapter 4

  Rabaul

  “What a nice surprise!”

  Those were my sister’s first words on the phone. It was the day after I’d sent over the voice recorder containing Ito’s story.

  “I listened to the whole thing in one sitting.”

  She sounded somewhat excited. She was pleased to learn that our grandfather was a skilled pilot, but even more moved to hear that he had loved our grandmother. After briefly expressing her impressions, she asked if I was free that night and invited me to dinner with someone from the newspaper she was working with.

  “I told him about our research, he’s very interested and wants to do dinner with us.”

  Since I didn’t have anything in particular planned for the evening, I agreed.

  I arrived at the hotel in Akasaka where we were to meet up and found Keiko alone. The newspaper guy had gotten tied up with a last-minute assignment and was running a little late. We decided to go on ahead to the restaurant and eat while we waited.

  “Grandma was loved by her first husband,” Keiko said with feeling after we’d placed our orders.

  “I wonder how she felt about him.”

  Keiko thought for a moment. “She really loved Grandpa. I’d never have imagined her loving someone else before him.”

  I nodded.

  “But you can’t ever know what’s inside someone’s heart. Maybe Grandma really did love Miyabe-san.” That was what Keiko was calling him now, Miyabe-san.

  “But they were married for just four years, most of which they spent apart, and then he died in battle. So maybe it wasn’t so hard to forget about him.”

  Keiko neither agreed nor disagreed with me.

  After a little while a tall man in a suit approached. It was Ryuji Takayama, the newspaper reporter. He apologized for his tardiness and hinted that he wouldn’t be able to stay long due to his last-minute assignment.

  Takayama had a gentle demeanor. I’d heard he was thirty-eight but he looked younger than that.

  “So you’re Kentaro? I’ve burdened your sister at work,” Takayama said with an affable smile after placing his order with the waiter. Since Keiko had said he was an incredibly capable reporter, I had expected him to be a more self-confident and assertive type. Instead there was a soft, kindly presence about him.

  He said that the newspaper was planning all sorts of features looking back at the postwar era as next year would mark the sixtieth since the end of WWII. That was why he had taken an interest when he’d heard that Keiko was researching her grandfather who had died as
a kamikaze.

  “I think the kamikaze attack”—Takayama appended the English word, making the whole phrase sound foreign—“is a theme we absolutely must include in the feature articles. The pilots were truly unfortunate.” As if in silent prayer, he briefly bowed his head and placed his hands flatly together on the tabletop. “Yet, this isn’t just an issue from the past. It’s extremely depressing to think about, but as we saw with 9/11, the world today is full of terrorist suicide bombings just like the kamikaze attack of old. I wonder why.” Takayama gave a faint sigh, then leaned forward slightly and said, “I think that in order to comprehend the phenomenon, it’s necessary to reconsider Japan’s kamikaze attack from a whole new point of view.”

  “Takayama-san, are you saying that the structure of terrorist suicide bombings and the Japanese kamikaze were the same?”

  Takayama nodded. “Historically speaking, organized suicide attacks are extremely rare, and the kamikaze attack of old and the terrorist suicide bombings of Islamic fundamentalists today are the two representative instances. Yes, I think it’s natural to assume there are common traits between them. In fact, there are newspapers in America that refer to the contemporary terrorist incidents as a kamikaze attack.”

  Takayama spent more time looking at my sister than me during his reply.

  It was obvious he was the person Keiko had in mind when she said she was just “parroting” her take on kamikazes. However, researching my grandfather, I’d come across more than a few experts on the Internet and elsewhere who held that “kamikaze” and “terrorist” were one and the same. It apparently wasn’t all that rare a view. Some famous TV newscasters had voiced similar opinions. As I was sadly uninformed about the kamikazes, I found myself unable to agree or disagree on that issue.

  Takayama continued, “Reading the kamikazes’ diaries, you see that many of the pilots were willing to give up their lives out of a religious spirit of martyrdom. Some even wrote that the day of their sortie was a day of great joy. But that shouldn’t merit surprise. Before the war, Japan was considered the land of the gods, ruled by the Emperor, himself a living god. Perhaps it was only natural that many youths felt joy at the prospect of martyring themselves for the sake of their country.” Takayama cast his eyes downward. “To put it plainly, it’s martyrdom, and it’s this spirit that Islamic extremists who conduct suicide attacks as acts of terrorism share.”