The Fugu Plan

by Marvin Tokayer

  Hanin just stared at him. The old man said nothing, only sat there, pleased with himself and with the grapevine that kept him informed about virtually everything that happened among the Jews.

  Shatzkes had been gazing out the window, watching the shadowy outlines of a small town as it passed by.

  "If the Japanese were agreeable before, and if we have done nothing, then why do you think they have had this change of heart? You know the Japanese better than we do."

  Hanin could only shake his head. "I think it can only be the Germans. They are very successful right now, and the Japanese are very, very fond of success. Perhaps, up to now, they felt they could, and should, hold out against, the advice of the Germans. But no one seems to be able to stand up to the Germans - not England, not France. Maybe now the Japanese think: 'We've chosen the winner; why not go all the way with him?'"

  They were silent for a moment, the only sounds in the car were the snores of their fellow passengers. "What will you say if they ask you why Jews are persecuted by the Nazis?" Hanin asked again.

  The response was no more satisfying this time than last. Rabbi Shatzkes again said nothing. The Amshenover rebbe said only: "We will see. We will simply have to do our best, im yirzeh ha-Shem. Now, as I am an old man, I need some sleep." Wrapping his coat more tightly around him, he retreated into his brief night prayers. Shortly thereafter, he was asleep. A few minutes later, after staring quietly out at the passing rice paddies for several miles, Shatzkes too, said his prayers and closed his eyes.

  Hanin could not sleep. Tomorrow could destroy the whole refugee effort - and possibly the refugees as well. And tomorrow had been entrusted to two old men who didn't seem to be sufficiently concerned about the danger. They slept - and Hanin worried - till the sun came up not far out of Kamakura.

  At 8:17, as promptly as it had departed Kobe thirteen hours before, the train pulled into Tokyo station. Hanin had been informed that they would be met at the station; but he was not prepared for the person who appeared.

  "Dr. Kotsuji! Is this a coincidence or are you here officially?"

  "Good morning! I am here 'officially,' as you put it. This is Captain Fukamachi," he introduced the young man in civilian clothes standing next to him, "and we have come to escort you to the naval officers' headquarters."

  Delighted at this first positive note in the proceedings, Hanin introduced the rabbis. Both Kotsuji and Fukamachi bowed low with respect and the entourage made its way out of the crowded station.

  "Dr. Kotsuji," Hanin said quietly as they waited for a driver to bring the official car, "we are a little in the dark as to the purpose of this discussion. Do you know what it is about, why we have been asked to come here, what they want to know from us? It is always better to be prepared beforehand for these things. If you could perhaps enlighten us. . . ."

  "Oh, no!" Kotsuji said airily. "Don't worry. I know nothing about it at all. They merely asked me to meet you here and bring you to the correct address. No problem. Weren't the cherry blossoms beautiful this year, Hanin-san?"

  Hanin was not reassured. He was even less so when he learned that they would proceed directly to the interrogation, leaving the two old men no time to rest, eat or recover from the rigors of the trip. The Japanese could be inadvertently inconsiderate, but they were usually solicitous for the elderly. The rabbis themselves, however, seemed unperturbed. They chatted with Kotsuji in elementary Hebrew about the state of the yeshivas in Kobe, and expressed their appreciation to him when Hanin told them of Kotsuji's part in finding rooms for the students. However, once again it seemed to Hanin that the two rabbis were not fully aware of the gravity of the situation.

  The naval officers' headquarters was four stories of yellow brick gleaming in the sun and set luxuriously back behind a clean sweep of lawn. At the door, waiting to greet them, was a translator introduced by Kotsuji only as Mr. Fujisawa, and an assistant whose name Hanin failed to catch. Much to his dismay, Fujisawa immediately divided the group in two: Hanin, Rabbi Shapiro and Kotsuji were ushered into a small sitting room, while the Amshenover rebbe and Rabbi Shatzkes, with Fukamachi and the translator, were led off down a long paneled corridor. Rabbi Shapiro hung back, protesting with great concern that his place was with the two older men, no matter where they were going. Hanin himself requested, with more decorum, that he also would like to accompany the two rabbis, but to no avail. Dr. Kotsuji politely insisted that both men join him in a small sitting room.

  "They will be fine," he said blandly. "Don't concern yourselves. It is not necessary for you to be with them. Mr. Fujisawa is one of the best translators in Japan. Please, sit here. Would you like some tea?"

  Kotsuji gestured to a comfortable armchair covered in white linen with antimacassars on the back and arms. Hanin had no choice but to accept the unwanted tea and attempt small talk. Shapiro perched on the edge of another chair and gnawed at his nails.

  They waited there only a few minutes before Fujisawa, the translator, appeared. "Hanin-san, would you be so kind as to come with me. We are having small problems."

  Hanin rose with a bound, relieved to be included but anxious at the "small problems." Shapiro was instantly at his side. The translator started to say his services were not needed, but noting the determination on the man's face, he was persuaded that perhaps all of them should come.

  Hanin and Rabbi Shapiro found Rabbi Shatzkes and the Amshenover rebbe seated in the windowless antechamber of a conference room. On the far side of a low table - abundantly spread with non-kosher foods - were four admirals in dress uniforms. Heads shaven, arms folded stiffly across their chests, they sat motionless. The two rabbis were calmly drinking green tea, waiting till their hosts could solve the problem of carrying out the interrogation. Unfortunately Yiddish had stumped Mr. Fujisawa, the "best translator in Japan."

  It was Captain Fukamachi's suggestion that Hanin would translate from Yiddish to English and Fujisawa would take it from English to Japanese. This would be tedious but possible. The admiral furthest to the left - the first among equals - grunted a monosyllable of approval. Hanin seated himself beside the rabbis and awaited the customary opening pleasantries.

  They were brief. In fact, Hanin thought with dismay, considering the usual time-consuming graciousness that customarily began such formal encounters, they were just short of insulting. "We appreciate your coming today; we appreciate your cooperating with us. . . ." Then, suddenly, the opening shot.

  "What is the inherent evil of your people that our friends the Germans hate you so much?"

  None of the admirals, not even the one who had spoken, deigned to look at the objects of the question. The query was translated across the double barrier.

  Rabbi Shatzkes was the more eminent scholar, and the rebbe deferred to him. But Rabbi Shatzkes had no answer. What could one say to such a question? How does one confront such arrogance, such a void of knowledge. Where does one begin? "Why do they hate us?" Shatzkes had often asked himself exactly that in the face of a lifetime of senseless atrocities that he had witnessed in Europe before his escape. Why? Why? Why was an old Jewish grandmother shot in the eyes for not being able to move as quickly as her grandchild? Why were the beards ripped from the faces of harmless old men leaving white dots of bone visible through the broken, bleeding skin? Why?

  "The Nazis hate the Jews because the Nazis know that we Jews are Asians."

  It was the Amshenover rebbe who had spoken. Scarcely three seconds had passed between the posing of the question and this calm response. It surprised the admiral, not because the rebbe rather then Shatzkes had answered - in Japan older people are expected to speak first - but because of its totally unforeseen nature. The admiral involuntarily shifted his eyes to look directly at the rebbe.

  "What does this mean - you are Asians. We are Asians!"

  "Yes," the rebbe agreed. "And you are also on the list."

  "What list?"

  The Amshenover rebbe smiled a smile so supremely calm, so warm, so totally out of keeping
with the threatening atmosphere which the officers had tried to create that, in spite of themselves, all four of them leaned forward, waiting for him to speak further.

  "My dear friends, I have just come from Europe. I have lived with the great hate that the Nazis have for others. I think that perhaps no one who has not lived in the midst of it can understand it. But to get even an inkling of the scope of their hate, don't read their writings in the censored translations they give you. Read what Nazis write in the original German. There, you will learn that you also are on their list of 'inferior people.' So are the gypsies, the blacks, the Slavs . . . and the Japanese.

  "Let me tell you a story," the rebbe continued, sitting back slightly in the hard chair. "In Berlin, not many years ago, perhaps three or four, a young German girl fell in love with a fine young man, a Japanese man, who was working at the Japanese Embassy. Naturally enough, the two young people wanted to marry, but such a thing could not be in Germany. Such a marriage was forbidden by law, by the laws of 'racial purity,' which prohibit a fine German girl from marrying a . . . Japanese."

  All four admirals were now staring at the rebbe, not even trying to conceal their interest. They had heard such stories about America which had changed its immigration laws to keep out the "Japs" or about the British who called Asians "Yellow Monkeys." And now, what was this man saying? That Japan's most successful ally - those who would rule the world with her - that the Germans too thought in such terms?

  "You are lying," the first admiral said.

  "No," the rebbe said, calmly. "Consider for yourself: What is the image of Hitler's master race? How does he describe it? In films, documentaries, newspapers, who is shown bringing victory home to the German fatherland? Always, always, the so-called Aryans. Tall, broad-shouldered, blond hair, blue eyes. ... I am not six feet tall. I do not have blue eyes. I don't have blond hair - even before it turned white my hair was not blond. The reason they hate me, the reason they hate all of us, is because we don't fit the image of the Aryan master race."

  He said no more. There was no need to point out the scarcity of tall, broad-shouldered, blond, blue-eyed Japanese.

  The admirals sat staring straight ahead for a long time after the old man had finished. Hanin, who had been merely a mouthpiece, neither adding nor subtracting an iota of the rebbe's words, seemed to have absorbed, in passing, some of his tranquility. Now he and the others were content to sit in silence. Quiet voices, not associated with this meeting, could be heard occasionally from the corridor outside. Finally, the first-among-equals let out a long nasal sigh and began speaking to his three associates. Barely imposing on the surrounding quiet, the four men spoke in gutteral undertones which even Fujisawa, the translator, could not make out. Eventually, one of the lesser admirals spoke directly to him.

  "Tell our Jewish guests there will now be a brief recess. Tell them we have been inexcusably inconsiderate in not allowing them time to rest from their long trip and in not offering proper refreshments. Tell them we will meet in two hours time in a more comfortable place." He paused, then added, "And be polite, Fujisawa-san."

  After the translation, the four officers stood as the Jews were shown out of the interrogation room. Fukamachi led the way to a suite of clean, Western-style rooms overlooking the garden behind the building and left them.

  Drained, Hanin slumped into a chair and offered quiet congratulations to the two rabbis. Shatzkes said little: the Amshenover rebbe was only a little more communicative.

  "The truth is difficult to avoid when it is set before you at your own request," he said. "Now, if you don't mind, I will claim the privilege of age and lie down right here to take a nap." He stretched out on one of the beds. Shapiro laid a blanket over him. Within seconds, he was asleep. Rabbi Shatzkes went into the bathroom to wash.

  Hanin stared unseeing at the formal garden, his muscles slowly turning to jelly. He was no more than vaguely concerned about the plans for the afternoon. He had stood on the brink of a catastrophe - the destruction of the entire refugee community as predicated so brutishly by those Nazi soldiers on the train the night before. Then he had witnessed an old man dissolve the danger with a handful of words. Almost too exhausted to feel even relief, he let his eyes close, and he too slept.

  When several hours later, the Jews were shown into a large conference room lined with windows, the atmosphere was entirely different. Again the four admirals were lined up proudly on one side of a table - their shaven heads glistening in the sunlight that streamed in past the open drapes. But now, seated beside them, were two newcomers, resplendent in long white robes and tall stiff black hats tied decorously under their chins. They were highranking Shinto priests Hanin realized, definitely "next to God." The heavy table had been set out with the inevitable tea, but also with bowls of apples and bananas and tangerines, plates of seaweed-wrapped rice balls and small mounds of chilled spinach in a sauce of sesame seeds and soy. Gone were the lobsters and other nonkosher dishes, and gone was the heavy hand of the military. The admirals were merely for show. Throughout the next four hours, they said not a word. From the opening greeting through the final farewells, the two priests were entirely in control.

  The discussion centered almost exclusively on religion: comparisons and contrasts between Shinto and Judaism, extended explanations of the theory of common origin (that the Japanese were descended, in part, from one of the "ten lost tribes" which had come to Japan) and the so-called "reverse theory of common origin" (that Moses had actually come to Japan to learn the wisdom of ancient Shinto during the forty days that the Bible had him on Mount Sinai, receiving the Torah from God). For over an hour, Rabbi Shatzkes described the basic principles, ideas and ceremonies of the Jews. The younger of the two priests responded with explanations of the customs and beliefs of Shinto. Of particular interest to Hanin who continued to do half the translating, was the entwined relationship between Shinto and Japan as religious and political state.

  It was late afternoon before the meeting drew to a close. As a final note, the Amshenover rebbe repeated the gratitude of the refugees to the Japanese for taking them in and treating them so well.

  An Admiral spoke briefly to the priests, and then the first admiral, in turn, reassured the rabbis. "Go back to your people. Tell them they have nothing to fear: we Japanese will do our utmost to provide for your safety and peace; you have nothing to fear while in Japanese territory."

  As he waited for the rabbis' response to these final sentences, it seemed to Hanin that the other three admirals shifted, just slightly, uncomfortably in their chairs. But it was a momentary thing. When he blinked to look more closely, they were again sitting straight and still. To Hanin, and the others discussing it on the uneventful train ride back to Kobe, it seemed that their trip had been an unqualified success.

  12

  WHILE A TYPHOON of anti-Semitism was creating havoc over much of the globe, the refugees in Kobe enjoyed the tranquility of the eye of the storm. In the late spring of 1941, although these fifteen hundred Jews were totally in the hands of the ally of their most deadly enemy, they had little anxiety as to their immediate safety. For whatever reason, and none of the refugees had the vaguest idea of what that reason might be, they had landed in Japan, a haven for Jews. From Japan, they feared nothing.

  By May, it was quite warm in Kobe. With little to do, the refugees relaxed in the rooms of Jewcom or milled quietly around the front-gate bulletin board where notices of accepted visa applications and other important items of news were posted. When Jewcom palled, they walked, and walked, and walked. They walked to the parks and through the parks. They walked along the broad main street of Motomachi, Kobe's colorful, crowded, brightly lit shopping area. Dodging bicycles, skirting the tiny makeshift cooking stoves that turned areas of sidewalk into instant restaurants, they traipsed from store to store, taking in at least with their eyes the abundance of products displayed.

  On an allowance of one and a half yen a day, there was little beyond food that the average refu
gee could afford. But simply looking was a pleasure in itself. Tiring of Motomachi, the refugees might stroll along the busy docks, unwittingly alerting Japanese harbor patrolmen who saw in every foreigner a potential spy or smuggler. Alternatively they might meander through the quiet streets of any of a score of similar neighborhoods, accepting without surprise the curious glances of the Japanese residents and the vigilant observation of the omnipresent police. Until their own visa notifications appeared on the Jewcom bulletin board, the refugees had very little else to do that spring. For them, it was a time of waiting, but a time of peace.

  For the refugees still in Lithuania, the spring of I94I was neither passive nor peaceful. From southern France to central Poland, from the north of Finland to the north of Africa, the Axis was in control. Though the extent of Hitler's plan for the entire Jewish people was not yet unmistakable, the commonplace atrocities - the degradation, imprisonment, starvation and murder that had highlighted his rule from the start - were clearly not abating with time. The exodus from Vilna, which had begun as an anxious but organized journey, became a rout. Those who already had - or had forged a Japanese transit visa and a Curacao stamp could no longer afford to hang back, hoping the situation would still allow them to remain safely in Europe. Nor could they now afford the time needed to insure the safety of each step along the way. Cajoling non-Jews into purchasing innocent short-distance tickets for them, many set out on their own once in Russia, avoiding Intourist altogether. Beyond the knowing eyes of the NKVD, refugees with rubles could safely purchase cheap tickets for themselves from one station to the next, and not arouse suspicion. When their money ran out, they hid, trembling with fear, under seats or slipped from one to the next, always looking back, always just a jump ahead of the conductor. Some didn't make it. Dragged from trains, they never were heard of again. But Russia was huge; only so much manpower could be delegated to tracking down fleeing Jews. For many, Vladivostok became a reality.