His all-Japanese outfit, commanded by a cadre of haole officers, was known as the 222nd Combat Team, and it became a running joke in the unit for older men to ask newcomers, “What’s your outfit, son?” And when the private replied, “The Two-Two-Two,” the old-timers would shout, “Listen! He’s playing train!” Later they would bellow, “What’s your unit?” and when the private replied, “The Two-Two-Two,” they would growl, “Speak up, son! Don’t stutter.”
The arm patch of the Two-Two-Two consisted of a blue sky against which rose a brown Diamond Head, at whose feet rested one palm tree and three white lines of rolling surf. Below in block letters stood the pidgin motto: “Mo Bettah.” It was a handsome patch, and spoke of Hawaii, but the outfit did not appreciate how much Mo Bettah home was than some other places until they set up their basic training camp at Camp Bulwer in the boondocks of Mississippi.
On the first day in town Goro Sakagawa had to go to the toilet, and through ignorance stumbled into the “White” toilet. “Get out of here, you goddamned yellow-belly!” a native growled, and Goro backed out. Others had similar experiences, so that trouble threatened, but that night Colonel Mark Whipple showed the kind of man he was. Assembling the entire unit he shouted, “You men have only one job. Allow nothing whatever, neither death nor humiliation nor fear nor hunger, to deviate you from that job. You are here to prove to America that you are loyal citizens. You can do this only by becoming the finest soldiers in the American army and the most efficient fighters.
“If the people of Mississippi want to abuse you, they are free to do so. And you will keep your big mouths shut and take it. Because if any man in this outfit causes even one shred of trouble, I will personally ride him right to the gates of hell. Are there any questions?”
“Am I supposed to take it if some local yokel calls me a slant-eyed yellow-belly?”
“Yes!” Whipple stormed. “By God yes! Because if you’re so sensitive that you are willing to imperil the future of all the Japanese in America for such a cause, then by God, Hashimoto, you are a slant-eyed yellow-belly. You’re a creep. You’re a damned Jap. You’re what everybody accuses you of being, and in my eyes you’re no man.”
“Then we take it?” Goro asked in deep, stomach-churning fury. “Whatever they want to call us?”
“You take it,” Whipple snarled. “Can’t you add, you damned, stubborn buddha-heads?” As he said this he laughed, and the tension was broken. “For the insults that one accidental man throws at you, are you willing to put into jeopardy the future of three hundred thousand Japanese? Don’t be idiots. For the love of Christ, don’t be idiots.”
From the rear ranks a sergeant grumbled, “I guess we can take it.”
Then Colonel Whipple said, “Keep this vision in mind, men. As a unit you’re going to strike the German army some day. And when you do, you’re going to win. Of that there can be no doubt, for I have never led finer men. And when you win, you will triumph over bigotry at home, over Hitlerism abroad, over any insult you have ever borne. Your mothers and fathers and your children after you will lead better lives because of what you do. Aren’t these stakes worth fighting for?”
Colonel Whipple laid down the most rigid rules and enforced them brutally: “Not a word of Japanese will be spoken in this outfit. You’re Americans. Under no circumstances are you to ask a white girl for a date. It makes local people mad. You are absolutely forbidden to date a colored girl. That makes them even madder. And they have four long trains that haul beer into this state every week. You can’t possibly drink it all.”
Remorselessly Colonel Whipple drove his men according to West Point traditions of military behavior and his own family traditions of civil decency. In all America no unit in training suffered more disciplinary action than the Two-Two-Two, for their colonel held them responsible both on the post and off, and at the slightest infraction, he punished them. There was only one flare-up. After a great deal of heart-probing consultation the good people of Mississippi decided that so far as public toilets and buses were concerned, the Japanese soldiers were to be considered white men and were thus obligated to use white facilities; but where socializing with the community was concerned, it was better if they considered themselves halfway between the white and the Negro and off-limits to each.
This was too much, and Goro went to see Colonel Whipple. “I appreciate what you said, Colonel, and we’ve been abiding by your rules. But this directive on toilets is just too much. I can urinate like a white man but I’ve got to socialize like a Negro. The basic thing we’re fighting for is human decency. Our men don’t want the kind of concessions Mississippi is willing to make. We want to be treated like Negroes.”
Colonel Whipple did not rant. He said quietly, “I agree with you, Sakagawa. Decency is one unbroken fabric without beginning or end. No man can logically fight for Japanese rights and at the same time ignore Negro rights. Logically he can’t do it, but sometimes he’s got to. And right now is one of those times.”
“You mean we’re to accept what Mississippi says, even though we know that given a chance they’d treat us worse than they do the Negroes?”
“That’s the tactical situation you find yourself in.”
“It’s so illogical our men may not be able to take it.”
Again Colonel Whipple failed to bellow. Instead he picked up an order and waved it at Goro, saying, “And the reason you’ll take it is this paper. The army has agreed to accept all Japanese boys who want to volunteer. Your two brothers in the V.V.V. will be transferred to the outfit tonight. Now if trouble were to start in Mississippi, all that I’ve managed to acquire for you fellows would be lost. So, Goro, you urinate where the haoles tell you to.”
In accordance with the new directive, the army announced that it would beef up the Two-Two-Two by adding 1,500 volunteers from Hawaii and 1,500 from the mainland, but the plan didn’t work because in Honolulu 11,800 rushed forward to serve, stampeding the registration booths. Seven out of eight had to be turned down, including Shigeo Sakagawa, who wept. But on the mainland only 500 volunteered, leaving a thousand empty spaces. Quickly the army returned to Hawaii and filled the gaps left by the poor response of the mainland Japanese, and in this second draft, young Shig was accepted.
When President Roosevelt compared the contrasting reactions of the two groups, he ordered Colonel Whipple to submit an explanation of what had happened, and Whipple wrote: “Far from being a cause for concern, the differential should encourage us in our devotion to the perpetual effectiveness of democracy. If the result had been any different, I should have been worried. That the Hawaii Japanese behaved well and that the mainland boys did not is to me, and I think to America, reassuring.
“In Hawaii, Japanese were free to own land. In California they were not. In Hawaii they could become schoolteachers and government employees. In California they could not. In Hawaii they were accepted into our best schools, but not in California. In Hawaii they were built into our society and became a part of us, but in California they were rejected.
“More important, when war came the Japanese on the mainland were herded into concentration camps and their belongings were ruthlessly stripped from them at five cents on the dollar. In Hawaii there was some talk of this, but it was never permitted to go very far. Right after Pearl Harbor a good many Japanese in Hawaii were rounded up for concentration camps, but my aunt tells me that she personally, along with other Caucasian leaders of the community, went to the jail and effected the release of those she knew to be loyal. In short, the Japanese in Hawaii had every reason to fight for America; those on the mainland had none; and the basic difference lay not in the Japanese but in the way they were treated by their fellow citizens.
“So is it not logical that if you tell a group of Hawaiian Japanese who have not been thrown into camps or robbed of their belongings, ‘You can volunteer to help us fight oppression,’ that 11,800 should leap forward? And is it not logical that if you go through concentration camps and tell the brother
s of these same men, ‘We have abused you, imprisoned you, humiliated you, and stolen your belongings, but now we want you to volunteer to fight for us,’ is it not logical that they should reply, ‘Go to hell’? I am astonished that so many of the mainland Japanese volunteered. They must be very brave men, and I shall welcome them in my unit.”
When President Roosevelt read the report he asked his aide, “Who is this Mark Whipple again?”
“You knew his father, Dr. Hewlett Whipple.”
“The boy sounds intelligent. Is he the one who’s leading the Japanese?”
“Yes. They’re on their way to Italy now.”
“We should expect some good news from that outfit,” the President said.
One night in September, 1943, Nyuk Tsin asked her grandson Hong Kong, “Are we overextended?”
“Yes.”
“If war ended tomorrow, would we be able to hold onto our properties?”
“No.”
“What do you think we should do?” the old lady asked.
“I seem to have acquired your courage,” Hong Kong replied. “I say, ‘Hold onto our lands.’ We’ll pay off as much debt as we can, and when the war ends we’ll tighten our belts and live on rice until the boom starts.”
“How many bad years must we look forward to?” the old matriarch asked.
“Two very difficult years. Two reasonably dangerous. If we can get through them, the hui will be prosperous.”
“I’m worried,” the old woman confessed, “but I agree with you that we must fight to a finish. However, I’ve been thinking that we might start to sell off a few of the houses, to relieve the pressure.”
“The pressure is only on you and me,” Hong Kong pointed out. “The others don’t know about it. If you’re not afraid, I’m not.”
It was a curious thing for an old woman of ninety-six to be worrying about the future, but she was, and it was not her future that concerned her, but that of her great family, the on-going thing that she had started but which was now more powerful than she. Therefore she said, “It is not only our money we are gambling with, Hong Kong, but that of all the Kees, those who are working and the girls in the stores and the old people. Thinking of them, are you still willing to hold onto everything?”
“It is for them that I’m doing it,” Hong Kong replied. “I know the delicate structure we’ve built. A house on top of a store on top of a job at Pearl Harbor on top of a little piece of land on top of an old man’s savings. Maybe it’s all going to crumble, but I’m willing to gamble that when it starts to totter, you and I will be smart enough to catch the falling pieces.”
“I think it’s beginning to totter now, Hong Kong,” the old woman warned.
“I don’t think it is,” her grandson replied, and for once he ignored his grandmother’s advice, and she said, “This is your decision, Hong Kong,” and he replied, “We started our adventure when the haoles ran away from the war, and I’m not going to run away now,” and she promised, “At least I won’t tell the others of my fears.”
He therefore held onto the fantastic, teetering structure—depending solely upon his own courage—and as Honolulu rents rose, and wages at Pearl Harbor, and profits from the stores, he applied the money Asia provided to further gambles, and the structure grew higher and more precarious, but he was never afraid of his perilous construction, and his old grandmother grew increasingly to realize that in Hong Kong she had developed a grandson she could truly admire. “In many ways,” she reflected, thinking back to the High Village and the warm days of her youth, “he is like my father. He is bold, and willing to engage in great battles, and he will probably wind up with his head in a cage in the center of Honolulu.” Then she thought of her father’s grisly visage, staring, neckless, down upon the years, and she concluded: “Was it a bad way to die?” And the perilous gamble of the Kee hui continued.
WHILE the four Sakagawa boys were in uniform, fighting for an unqualified citizenship, their parents and their sister Reiko were experiencing grave contradictions and confusions. On the one hand, the older Sakagawas prayed for the safe return of their sons, and this implied an American victory, at least over the Germans, and accordingly they listened with gratification when Reiko-chan read them the local Japanese newspaper, the Nippu Jiji, which told of victory in Europe. But on the other hand, they continued to pray for Japanese victory in Asia, for their homeland was in trouble and they hoped that it would triumph, never admitting to themselves that American victory in Europe and Japanese victory in Asia were incompatible.
Then one day Mr. Ishii appeared furtively at the barbershop, whispering, “Tremendous news! I must stop by to see you tonight.” And before Sakagawa-san could halt the little man, the latter had vanished into another Japanese store.
That evening, after Sakagawa had closed the barbershop and walked the girl barbers safely home, ignoring the whistles of American sailors who loafed on Hotel Street, Kamejiro said to Reiko, “You can be sure that Mr. Ishii has something very important for us,” and the two hurried through the dark streets to the little cottage in Kakaako. There Mr. Ishii waited, and after the household was settled and the blinds drawn, he strode dramatically to the table where the day’s issue of the Nippu Jiji lay and with fury tore it to bits, threw it on the floor, and spat on it.
“Thus I treat the enemies of Japan!” he cried.
“I haven’t read it …” Reiko pleaded, trying to halt him.
“Never again will you read that filthy propaganda!” Mr. Ishii announced grandly. “I told you, didn’t I, that it was all American lies? You laughed at me and said, ‘What does Mr. Ishii know about war?’ My friends, I will tell you what I know. I know what is really happening in the world. And in America all good Japanese know. It is only you fools who have to read the Hawaii newspapers who do not know.”
Flamboyantly, he whipped out from his coat pocket a Japanese newspaper printed in Wyoming, the Prairie Shinbun, and there for Reiko to see were the exciting headlines: “Imperial Forces Defeat Americans in Bougainville.” “Great Japanese Victory at Guadalcanal.” “President Roosevelt Admits Japan Will Win the War.” Most of the stories appearing on the front pages had been picked up from Japanese shortwave broadcasts emanating from military headquarters in Tokyo, and all purveyed the straight Japanese propaganda line. One story in particular infuriated the hushed group in the Sakagawa living room: “American Marines Confess Stabbing Helpless Japanese Soldiers with Bayonets.” The story came from Tokyo and could not be doubted.
When the horror at American brutality subsided, Mr. Ishii proceeded with the important news, a story in which the Wyoming editors summarized, by means of Imperial releases, the progress of the war, and it was apparent to all in the little room that Japan was not only triumphing throughout the Pacific but that she must soon invade Hawaii. “And then, Sakagawa-san, what are you going to tell the emperor’s general when he strides ashore at Honolulu and asks, ‘Sakagawa, were you a good Japanese?’ You, with four sons fighting against the emperor. And do you know what the general is going to say when he hears your reply? He’s going to say, ‘Sakagawa, bend down.’ And when you have bent down, the general himself is going to unscabbard his sword and cut off your head.”
None of the Sakagawas spoke. They looked at the newspaper dumbly, and Reiko picked out the headlines. It was a paper published openly in Wyoming, it had passed the United States censor, and what Mr. Ishii had read from it was true. Japan was winning the war and would soon invade Hawaii. In great pain of conscience Sakagawa-san looked at the paper which he could not read and asked Reiko-chan, “Is it true?” And his daughter said, “Yes.”
It was one of the most exasperating anomalies of the war that whereas the F.B.I. and naval security kept very close watch on the Japanese newspapers in Hawaii, and saw that they printed only the strictest truth, with no stories at all datelined Tokyo, the Japanese-language newspapers in the states of Utah and Wyoming were free to print whatever they wished, it having been decided by the local mil
itary that the official Japanese communiqués were so ridiculous that they would in time defeat themselves, as indeed they did. So the mainland Japanese press, often edited by die-hard samurai types, kept pouring out an incredible mess of propaganda, rumor, anti-American sentiment and downright subversive lies, and when copies of the papers reached Hawaii, where rumors were apt to be virulent, their effect was shocking.
“I will tell the emperor’s general,” Sakagawa-san finally explained, “that my sons fought only in Europe. Never against Japan.”
“It will do no good!” Mr. Ishii said sadly. “The emperor will never forgive you for what you have done.”
Sakagawa-san felt weak. He had always had doubts about sending his sons to war, and now the Wyoming paper had fortified those doubts. Dumbly he looked at his old guide, and Mr. Ishii, after enjoying the moment of humiliation, finally said, “I will put in a good word for you with the general. I will tell him you have always been a good Japanese.”
“Thank you, Mr. Ishii!” the dynamiter cried. “You are the only friend I can trust.”
The Sakagawas went to bed that night in considerable torment, so the next day at her barber chair Reiko waited until an intelligent-looking young naval officer sat down, and when he had done so, she asked quietly, “Could you help me, please.”
“Sure,” the officer said. “Name’s Jackson, from Seattle.”
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