The War Ended 30 Years Ago!

- Yakov M. Hirschson In a horrifying and grand climax to the long and bitter war that had engulfed virtually the entire globe, America dropped two atomic bombs on Japan on August 6 and 9, 1945, ushering in the atomic age and making it clear that if the Japanese did not surrender at once they would face not merely occupation but obliteration. After days of negotiation, the Japanese accepted surrender unconditionally, except for the stipulation that the Stop position of Japan’s emperor remain intact. On September 2, 1945, representatives of the Japanese government signed the surrender document aboard the USS Missouri. World War II was formally and finally over. People around the Fighting... world and especially in America—the country that carried the brunt of the Pacific war—celebrated the end of the most bloody, costly and horrendous The War Ended conflict in human history. Even as the great armies of the world demobilized and began repatriating their troops, one Japanese 30 Years Ago! soldier in the Philippines never laid down his arms. The news of his country’s surrender failed to reach The bizarre and almost comical episode of him and for the next 30 years he lived in isolation, the Japanese soldier who continued fighting carrying on the war against an enemy that no for his country 30 years after the surrender longer existed. Read how this individual fought fanatically to keep up a non-existent three-decade of Japan and the end of World War II long fight. 98 | ZMAN • February 2012 ZMAN • Shevat 5772 | 99 he Japanese at the time of World War to the Allied Supreme Commander, who elements within his own army. Therefore, II had barely emerged from their had not yet been appointed but was likely he stayed in the island jungles of Lubang for Tfeudal past. Part of that past included 29 years to continue his one-man guerrilla fanatical adherence to a warrior code of General Douglas MacArthur. campaign against the enemy that no longer behavior that put loyalty to the emperor to beBarely the extremelycontaining self-confident, a smile, arrogantone of existed. above life and limb. Truman’s cabinet members then said, “Yes, The Mikado, as the Japanese emperor and since that Supreme Commander is likely was known, was worshipped literally as a to be good, old Douglas MacArthur, it will be Hiroo Onoda deity. Although in practice the Mikado at the just like one deity answering to another….” Onoda was born on March 19, 1922, and time of the war—Emperor Hirohito—did in 1942 at the age of 20, was recruited for not exercise much of his rights over his the imperial Japanese army. At the time countrymen, his word was considered The Last Fanatic he was far away from home, working for a divine and loyalty to him was absolute. division of the Tajima Yoko trading company According to the ancient warrior code, September 2, 1945, numerous Japanese the shame of surrender was worse than soldiersWhile scattered the war throughout did officially the crumbled end on death. Japanese soldiers regularly fought to empire were so loyal to land and emperor the death no matter how clear it was that the that they refused to accept that the war was over. Instead, they remained hidden in the to employ kamikaze pilots, young men often US navy personnel try to shoot down an approaching kamikaze plane. forests and jungles and fought for years until battle was lost. Japan was the first country they were captured or killed, succumbed to boarded one-way, bomb-laden planes for thewith express little flying purpose experience of crashing who knowinglythem into came to their senses. American warships. Indeed, the kamikazes the Estimatesadverse conditions ran that in as the many field oras simply1,000 were used with considerable success when conventional battle methods failed. after their leaders signed the surrender Loyalty to the Mikado was so extreme document,Japanese soldiers which refused explicitly to give ordered up the fightthe that historians agree that arguably the major demobilization of all Japanese forces. Over time their numbers dwindled and the world war late into 1945, long after their position breathed more freely in the knowledge that wasreason clearly the Japanesehopeless, continued was that to they fight were the these fanatics were at last gone. unable to face the idea that their emperor Or so they thought… might be removed from his position—or, One decade passed and another and worse yet, tried as a war criminal. Even Part of a kamikaze plane that was shot down by the another and some of the soldiers had not yet after two atom bombs were dropped on gun crew of a US warship is seen on the ship’s deck. given in. Lieutenant Hiroo Onoda was one their battered nation, the Japanese would of those. His country had entered the war USS Intrepid, seconds before being hit by a kamikaze pilot. not immediately surrender, in great part due post-war administration of the country. dreaming of conquering Southeast Asia and to the fear that the Allies would remove the Most incredible of all, despite the public emperor from power. declaration, many Japanese continued to to do everything in his power to see that Then, even after the surrender, which view and treat the emperor as a deity until the entire Pacific, and he saw it as his duty the emperor announced directly over the his death in 1989! Onoda had been shipped to the tiny As an aside, the story is told how before islanddream of fulfilled. Lubang in the Philippines in 1944 to had ever heard him speak), radio (itAllied was theCommander-in-Chief first time his people of Truman and his cabinet got into a heated forces that were swiftly approaching, but he debatethe first whether bomb orwas not todropped, make removalPresident of neverfight a received guerrilla the action order against to disengage. the American When Douglas McArthur had the emperor part of their surrender terms. If the war ended he read about it and heard theto Pacificforce theForces emperor General to they made it part of the terms, the Japanese the reports of the surrender. Nevertheless, publicly renounce his might never give up. Yet, if they allowed him since his commanders had never formally status as a deity so that to stay, it could cause problems. Finally, they commanded him to lay down his arms, he he could obtain Japanese believed that the reports were falsehoods A kamikaze pilot crashes his plane into a ship while the smoke cooperation in his emperor intact but make him answerable spread by the enemy or perhaps subversive of the rounds that missed him are still visible in the sky. came up with the idea to leave the office of 100 | ZMAN • February 2012 ZMAN • Shevat 5772 | 101.

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