The final death blow to the Japanese Imperial Navy occurred during the Battle of Okinawa – the sinking of the super-battleship Yamato. This pride of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) was named after Japan itself, IJN Yamato, the historic name for Japan and was the pride of the nation.

Yamato was the largest warship ever built up to that time. Compared to ships of the time it was simply a monster. It carried larger guns (18-inch) than any warship and could fire a 3,200 lb armor-piercing projectile more than 26 miles. For reference, a Ford Escape weighs about 3,200 lbs. 26 miles, as the crow flies, is about the distance from the White House to the runways at Dulles International Airport. It was armored to withstand the impact of a 3,200 lb armor-piercing shell. And it was fast.

The historian Richard B. Franks is noted for his exhaustive research centered on World War II in the Pacific – or as he emphasizes, the Asia-Pacific War. While the major combatants in the region were Japan vs. primarily the United States/Australia/New Zealand/Britain/Netherlands, Franks’ research reminds the reader that there was no nation in the Asia-Pacific region that was not impacted by Japanese occupation. In an early post, Civilian Deaths, we considered that between 1936-1945 the Empire of Japan was responsible for some 30 million civilian deaths. By and large these were not combat deaths, but were deaths by slave labor, starvation, deprivation and disease in places like Burma, Vietnam (then known as French Indochina), Korea, Indonesia, China and the Philippines. The point Franks is making is the effect of the narrow vision of the historical revisionists (in Frank’s mind) who argue that the use of atomic weapons could not be justified by an argument of saving American lives lost during an invasion of the home islands. Franks argues that ending the war as soon as any means was available was about ending massive Asian deaths in the Japanese-occupied/controlled areas of the Empire outside of the home islands. In the last 12 months of the war, 1 million people died in Vietnam due to starvation and disease.

Franks worries that history is being lost/ignored in academic circles of historians in the West and in Asia. At a recent meeting of historical scholars of the Asia Pacific region, in the sessions on World War II, there seemed to be a general unawareness of the widespread death among Asia people as the scholars only focused on allied inflicted casualties on the Japanese people of the home islands (blockade, bombing, fire bombing and ultimately the atomic bombs). While those are valid areas of historical research and consideration, it loses context of a larger war – one that the Empire of Japan started and prosecuted with a brutality to Asian people that was rooted in racism, ultranationalism, and a manifest destiny of greater Japan.

One often overlooked aspect of Catholic teaching on just-war theory is that it exists, in part, to protect the humanity of the war fighters. Much strategic war planning and just-war theorizing operates – as it should – on the “big picture.” But “big pictures” can be a composite of small pictures: the experience of battles, but also the discovery of what had come before the battle. All of this shapes and frames the picture of the next battle and the next strategy. It shapes the mindset of the war fighters as well as the war planners.

This week the posts have addressed the combat in Manila, Iwo Jima, the naval battle of Okinawa, civilian deaths and more. But I want to pause and return to the Philippines. US Army and Naval personnel had a long rich history and connection to the Philippines before the war – many having resided in the islands for 20 years or more. Their return to the Philippines in 1944 and 1945 was shocking. Before the 1944 landings at Leyte and 1945 landings at Luzon, the allies were receiving guerilla reports of deteriorating conditions in and around Manila, the treatment of POWs at Camp O’Donnell and Cabanatuan, the condition of American civilians interned at Santo Tomas College, the state of prisons and other detention facilities, and more. It was different to become an eye witness. 

What was discovered had a profound emotional and psychological effect on American soldiers as well as the U.S. public when they learned about Japanese atrocities in the Philippines. The effect cannot be overstated. It had a direct impact on the ferocity of combat and the American public’s perception of the Pacific War.

American forces came face to face with evidence of years of brutal Japanese occupation. At the POW camps (Cabanatuan and Camp O’Donnell), thousands of U.S. and Filipino prisoners had died of starvation, disease, and abuse. Those liberated were emaciated, confirming the worst fears of the US authorities and their brothers in arms. At civilian internment camps such as Santo Tomás and Los Baños, internees (Americans, Europeans, and others) were found near starvation. The Los Baños raid in February 1945 was driven in part by intelligence that the Japanese planned to massacre the civilians. After the Battle of Manila, U.S. soldiers saw the aftermath of systematic atrocities — civilians bayoneted, burned, and shot, including women and children. About 100,000 civilians were killed in one month. The guerilla reports were no longer an abstraction. 

In a letter home, one of the soldiers on the mission to liberate Santo Tomás wrote: “I thought I had seen suffering before, but when I walked through those gates and saw our own people, little children with their bones showing through their skin, I knew then why we were here.” It was a boost to morale knowing they were liberating their countrymen and Filipinos, reinforcing their sense of mission. The soldiers saw themselves not only as fighting an enemy but as rescuers. 

A veteran of the Cabanatuan raid wrote of the liberated POWs: “They were skeletons in rags. It was like walking into a graveyard where the dead still breathed. Every man in our unit swore he’d never forget what the Japs had done to them.” Many soldiers described these experiences as creating a hatred of the Japanese after seeing what had been done to POWs and civilians. Some veterans admitted it hardened their reluctance to take prisoners in combat – as well as instilling a latent rage and desire for vengeance that needed to be addressed.

Among U.S. troops word spread quickly. Letters home, informal briefings, and direct eyewitness testimony circulated through units. Even soldiers who hadn’t seen the camps firsthand knew the stories” by mid-1945.

After the Battle of Manila, Time Magazine, March 12, 1945 wrote: “Manila is dead. Its people were butchered in their homes, its buildings reduced to ash. In Asia, as in Europe, atrocity is the enemy’s chosen weapon.” In his book Rampage, James A. Scott reaches the same conclusion, but makes the point that it did not begin at the battle of Manila.  It began the day the Japanese reached the Philippines. And perhaps MacArthur and US leadership should have expected how this unfolded. It has been the same in China in 1937 with the “Rape of Nanjing.”

Across the U.S. press, editors made sure to highlight parallels between Japanese actions in Manila and Nazi crimes in Europe, reinforcing the idea that this was a war of civilization against barbarism.  The point is being made that where in Europe the atrocities were committed by the elite German SS troops, in the Pacific it was the practice of the entire Japanese Imperial Army. In parallel, the Office of War Information (OWI) and Army public affairs highlighted these stories, both to inform the homefront but also to justify the sacrifices of the ongoing campaigns.

The reports fed a strong belief that the Japanese leadership (and by extension, the nation) bore collective guilt for barbarity. This made the American public more accepting of the war’s escalating violence, including strategic bombing of cities and, later, the atomic bombings.

Perhaps the most intrinsic purpose of Just War Theory is the protection of humanity, not just of society, but of the war fighters. Many of these Army units would be slated for the Nov 1945 invasion of the Japanese home islands. As Iwo Jima and Okinawa showed, resistance would be furious. As the naval battle off Okinawa demonstrated, the attacks would be maniacle and suicidal.

One of the dynamics of extended warfare is habituation. One begins to get used to civilians used as combat troops – it’s what “they do.” One begins to see the use of flame throwers and flame tanks as proven tactics to eradicate entrenched enemy positions because you know they won’t surrender. And they don’t. Soldiers carry the eye witness accounts of the enemy’s brutality and cruelty – and the grapevine carries the stories to the larger audience in theatre and at home. Some things can not be unseen.

1945 is a year of escalating violence increasingly seen as against an enemy who deserved no quarter. It is a year when the enemy will not surrender and yet there is a wider issue than just winning a war. It is stopping the crimes against humanity that have ravaged the Asia-Pacific nations since 1936.

One way or the other the war will end. As Major General Graves Erskin, USMC, said of Iwo Jima, “Victory was never in doubt.  Its cost was. …What was in doubt, in all our minds, was whether there would be any of us left to dedicate our cemetery at the end.”

The war will end. Victory was not in doubt, only the cost to humanity and to human life. And not just the soldiers, sailors, and aviators of allied forces, but to people of countries of the 10 million square miles that was the Empire of Japan at its height in 1942.

Image credit: various photographs from Naval Aviation Museum, National World War II Museum, and US Navy Archives.

The vast number of islands that were invaded/recaptured by the Allied forces were not highly occupied by civilian populations. Iwo Jima had virtually no inhabitants. Very different experiences were encountered on Saipan, in the Philippines, and on especially on Okinawa whose pre-invasion civilian population was estimated at 300,000 people. Okinawans were Japanese citizens, at least in law.

After the 1879 annexation of the Ryukyu Kingdom, Okinawa was made a prefecture of Japan. By the time of the Allied landings, Okinawans were Japanese citizens in law: subject to conscription, taxation, and wartime mobilization like all other Japanese. Their cultural and social status was something different. The longer and deeper roots of Okinawa were Chinese in custom and perspective and as a result, Okinawans were often regarded by mainland Japanese as a peripheral or inferior people, with distinct language, customs, and history. The Okinawan (Ryukyuan) language was suppressed in schools in favor of standard Japanese. Children caught speaking Okinawan dialects were sometimes punished. Mainland Japanese officials and soldiers stationed in Okinawa frequently treated locals as less disciplined, less loyal, or “not quite Japanese.” 

Prior to 1944, Okinawans could join the Japanese military but were rarely assigned to combat ranks, most often serving in labor units, auxiliary roles, or support services. After the fall of Saipan in July 1944, Japan recognized that Okinawa was likely to be the next U.S. target. At that point the 32nd Japanese Army was stationed on Okinawa, and the Japanese authorities began mass mobilization of the Okinawan population. The mobilization had three primary elements:

The Battle of Okinawa which began with the initial invasion on 1 April 1945 was the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific Theater of World War II. It was the bloodiest battle of the Pacific War. The most complete tally of deaths during the battle is inscribed on the Cornerstone of Peace monument at the Okinawa Prefecture Peace Memorial Museum, which identifies the names of each individual who died at Okinawa in World War II. At the time of the June 1995 unveiling 234,183 names were inscribed. Continued historical research leads to the addition of names. Today, the monument lists more than 242,000 names, including 149,634 Okinawans; 77,823 Imperial Japanese soldiers; 14,010 Americans soldiers, Marines and sailors; and smaller numbers of people from other countries.

What is little known is that more naval personnel (4,907) were killed in action than either Army (4,675) or Marine (2,938) soldiers.

Iwo Jima is a small volcanic island about 750 miles south-southeast of Tokyo. The island had two operating airfields from which flew Japanese fighters and bombers. From late 1944 to early 1945, the Japanese stationed fighters and bombers on Iwo Jima. Their mission was to intercept the U.S. B-29s bombing Japan and to conduct night bombing raids on the Mariana airfields to disrupt U.S. bombing operations. Japanese bombers conducted about nine significant raids against the Marianas. The night raids were small in scale,  typically 5 to 20 Mitsubishi G4M “Betty” bombers. The raids never seriously curtailed B-29 missions as U.S. forces had ample construction battalions to repair damage quickly. The Japanese air raids from Iwo Jima on the Marianas were annoying but not decisive. Their main effect was psychological and tactical, not strategic.

The island lay virtually under the direct flight path to Tokyo of B-29 bombers operating out of Saipan and Tinian allied airfields. The direct distance was 1,350 miles but in order to avoid Iwo Jima’s fighters, the flight route was 1,700 miles one way. Despite the route, the island served as an early warning station for Japanese mainland defense.

The strategic reason for invading and taking Iwo Jima was to eliminate the early warning capability, the fighter intercepts on the bombers, the nuisance bombing raids on B-29 bases, shorten the route to/from the Japanese home islands for the “finicky” B-29s, and provide an emergency diversion landing site for returning B-29 bombers. This last feature came into use during the intense fighting on Iwo Jima and by war’s end was responsible for saving ~2,400 US Army Air Force pilots and flight crews.

In yesterday’s long post I attempted to bring together naval fleet, air and Marine Corps-Army amphibious efforts up to the end of 1944 and into early 1945. In earlier posts, we considered key engagements and their impact on the shape and prosecution of the war: Saipan (strategic importance and civil deaths) and a post, Battles that Changed War Strategy (Biak, Peliliu, and the air battles at Philippine Sea and Formosa) which pointed to the changing tactics and objectives of Japan as the war approached the home islands. The implications of all this was hinted at in the post Ketsu-Go outlining the strategic and tactical defense of the home islands. By the autumn of 1944 all roads led to the Philippines – from both MacArthur’s Southwest Pacific command and Nimitz’s Central Pacific command.

The Philippine Islands have their own unique history with the United States as friend and foe, but by 1941 it was home to a large number of Americans, American Corporations, and Gen. Douglas MacArthur who served as commander of U.S. Army Forces in the Far East. Manila had been his home since 1924.

Manila was known as the “Pearl of the Orient.” It was an international city that was the nexus of Filipino, Spanish, American and Asian cultures. In addition, the city’s population included Chinese, Japanese, Germans, British, Indians, and small groups from most European countries. The city was a center for universities and colleges, convents, monasteries and churches, and their accompanying treasures – including art, literature, and especially architecture – dated to the founding of the city. 

A reader mentioned that they were surprised that as a former naval officer I had not offered more coverage on the operations of the US Navy during the War in the Pacific. While it was perhaps inevitable given my goals for this series, nonetheless let me recount some of the major fleet actions and operations from Pearl Harbor until late 1944. Fair warning: it is a longer than average post.

It is important to remember that the first 12 months of the war in the Pacific was focused on stopping the advancing Japanese forces in the Southwest Pacific – especially stopping them from cutting off Australia and New Zealand from communications and supply lines to the US Pacific Forces. This led to a series of major naval battles in 1942 and 1943 miles away from Tokyo and from Pearl Harbor. Battles that were extremely critical to the war effort, yet unless you are interested in naval history, they are battles that are likely unknown to you. They were either surface-v-surface action and on several occasions aircraft carrier-v-carrier battles. Some of the key engagements are listed below.

Battle of the Coral Sea (May 4-8, 1942): The first naval battle fought almost entirely by aircraft carriers, the Battle of the Coral Sea checked a major Japanese offensive towards Australia/New Zealand, specifically an invasion of Port Morsby. The naval battle was fought in an area south east of New Guinea and south of the Solomon Islands. Because of the battle, the invasion convoy turned back, and the operation was cancelled. This was the first major Japanese offensive in the Pacific to be stopped. But it came at the cost of the fleet carrier USS Lexington and a fleet oil tanker – two assets we could ill afford to lose at that point in the war. The Japanese lost one aircraft carrier with a second one heavily damaged. Both of these carriers were expected to be part of the Battle of Midway. Their presence may well have changed the result of that engagement.

In the previous posts we paused to look back to the historical currents that shaped Japan in the 19th and 20th centuries. The posts were an attempt to provide a sense of the influences, perspectives, aspirations, and national identity that formed Japan to see its destiny as the leader of an Asia-Pacific region – and the rise of nationalism and militarism that were the means to accomplish its vision. The posts also pointed to the body-politics that was Japan: a divine Emperor, a civil government that resembled Britain, a constitution that assured a premier place for the military, and yet a great deal of uncertainty on how it all was governed. Historians agree about many things, but not the role of the Emperor, especially his degree of responsibility and decision authority for the war that engulfed the Asia-Pacific region in 1941.

Returning to the timeline of the unfolding war, in general, we have not gone into detail about naval and land battles. We have spoken about key engagements and their impact on the shape and prosecution of the war: Saipan (strategic importance and civil deaths) and a post, Battles that Changed War Strategy (Biak, Peliliu, and the air battles at Philippine Sea and Formosa) which pointed to the changing tactics and objectives of Japan as the war approached the home islands. The implications of all this was hinted at in the post Ketsu-Go outlining the strategic and tactical defense of the home islands.