Pearl Harbor: an Imperial Japanese Army Officer's View Tokyo, Japan

Pearl Harbor: An Imperial Japanese Army Officer's View Yamamoto Masao Tokyo, Japan Translated by Roger Dingman

My life cannot be divided into portions changed radically by the Pearl Harbor attack. But recently I have begun to realize that Pearl Harbor and the events immediately preceding and following it did bring about sudden, overwhelming changes to me as an officer in the Imperial Japanese Army. I believe lying is terrible. I will try to report briefly, as best as I can remember, and without artifice or reservation, on my various experiences and research findings. I came into the world in February 1923, about six months before the great Kanto earthquake. I was born as the fourth son into the family of a merchant house of Kanda, Tokyo, where there were already three brothers and one sister. My family ran a small store, founded at the time in the late Meiji period when Saville Row clothing for men sud- denly became very fashionable, that sold buttons, woolen cloth, and linings. My father was said at one time to have arbitrarily dubbed it "ima taiko," or "rags to riches."1 The great Kanto earthquake just after my birth forced the bour- geois to face sudden and great changes. But while the tremblor wrecked shops in the first-class commercial districts of Tokyo, it remained pos- sible for my family to continue a life of waiting on customers who dwelt in low-roofed homes in the tranquil suburbs. When my father died early in the Showa period we unfortunately experienced the grim reality of being overwhelmed with debt. Not to change our way of life would have been totally idealistic. Giving up our home in the suburbs, and forcing our customers to change as well, the entire family

The Journal of American-East Asian Relations, Vol. 3, No. 3 (Fall 1994) © Copyright 1994 by Imprint Publications, Inc. All rights reserved. 1. Trans. note: Ima taiko is an expression that refers to Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1537-98) who put an end to the warring states period and achieved the unification of Japan. It literally means "Now I am the great minister of state," or one who has risen from humble origins to the pinnacle of power and success. I am indebted to Professor Takahashi Hisashi for explaining the meaning of the term, which Colonel Yamamoto correctly suspected would baffle Americans, to me. For further information on the origins of the term and its application to Hideyoshi, see Kodansha Encyclopedia of Japan (Tokyo, 1983), 7:297, 8:94- 96. I am also deeply grateful to Professor Takahashi for his help in arriving at an accu- rate translation of other particularly difficult words and phrases in the original text of this article.

249 moved into a two- or three-story shop. With our mother, who had never gone to school but who had learned courageously from the vi- cissitudes of life, as its center, my two eldest brothers began the struggle to rebuild the family. At this point it is necessary to say a few words about general social conditions in Japan during those changing times between the end of the Taisho era (1925) and the outbreak of the Manchurian Incident (1931). Why did I, the fourth son of a merchant family, come to choose the life of a professional soldier? The choice cannot simply be said to be due to the influence of "militarism," for there were various other important reasons for it as well. In Japan at that time, the custom of apprenticeship begun in the Edo period continued to prevail. One of its manifestations was for poor men and poor farmers who needed to reduce the number of mouths to feed to send their children, under a contract in which they labored at cost for their room and board, to live with some wealthy farmer or merchant. There was also the system of doing this by sign- ing a contract that provided for prior payment for work to be done. These two procedures had an additional purpose: The son or daugh- ter sent off to live as an apprentice was to be taught various skills, manners, and discipline. The shared conditions of labor were severe. A pattern of discipline that required on-the-job training from dawn to dusk was employed. A holiday called Servants' Day observed twice annually was the only respite from work. The master provided food, clothing, and lodging-and the servant, burdened with debt, wept copiously. Very nearly a slave, waving his hands, off to work the child would go. After the time of my family's decline, as the time for attending school approached, fortunately or unfortunately opportunities for me to hear of the pain and miseries of this system from our old employees became more frequent. One day in my fifth year of primary school, I was summoned by my mother. She said: "You've said since infancy that you didn't like shopkeeping and wanted to become a military man. As a parent, I'd like to grant that request. But how much will you cooperate in trying to achieve that? In the event you fail the examinations you must pass, you will have to abandon the road to a military career. You will have to walk the road of the merchant that begins with apprenticeship. Please be aware of that. I will ask your elder brothers about your studying until the end of middle school." Those words were something akin to an electric shock for me. If I failed my examinations, there would be nothing but life on shopkeepers' row for me!2 My oldest brother was working off his apprentice-

2. Trans. note: The precise term used here is "lantern row," which refers to the paper lanterns on which shopkeepers traditionally wrote their name and trade.