Kamikaze attacks were made by Japanese servicemen throughout the final, desperate year of the Second World War (1939-45). Planes, piloted rockets, and boats were packed with explosives with the intention of causing maximum damage to the enemy, but with no realistic chances of survival for the pilots. These extraordinary tactics were deemed necessary as the only way to prevent an Allied invasion of Japan. Far less successful than hoped due to a plethora of Allied defensive response measures, the 4,000 kamikaze pilots who gave their lives were, nevertheless, honoured, revered, and remembered in their home country as young men willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to defend their homeland.
The Kamikaze Name
The name kamikaze means 'divine winds,' and its origins lie in the failure of the Mongol invasions of Japan, 1274 and 1281. Kublai Khan's huge invasion fleets, besides being rebuffed by courageous samurai, were seriously damaged by typhoon storms. The Japanese credited these storms as being of divine origin, especially because, as a last resort, prayers for assistance had been made to the Shinto god of war, Hachiman. The name kamikaze was revived during WWII's Pacific War since Japan faced a similar invasion threat, this time from the US and Allied armed forces. Desperate measures were once again required if Japan was to be saved from foreign occupation.
Kamikaze became the new popular name for missions where Japanese servicemen conducted attack missions from which they hoped to inflict maximum damage upon the enemy but which would almost certainly end in their own death. The Japanese services officially called these attack groups Tokko or Tokkotai, which was an abbreviation of Tokubetiu Kogeki, meaning 'Special Attack Units.'
Westerners quickly equated the kamikaze attacks with suicide missions. However, for the Japanese themselves, the link between kamikaze and suicide was not so emphatic. Lieutenant General Kawabe explains the difference:
We believed our spiritual conviction in victory would balance any scientific advantage [of the Allies]…You call our Kamikaze attacks "suicide attacks". This is a misnomer, and we felt very badly about your calling them "suicide attacks". They were in no sense suicide. The pilot did not start out on his mission with the intention of committing suicide. He looked upon himself as a human bomb which could destroy a certain part of the enemy fleet for his country. They considered it a glorious thing, while a "suicide" may not be so glorious.
(Largas, 38)
The Pilots
Kamikaze pilots were at first volunteers. Their choice was regarded as highly honourable, and they were feted as national heroes. Pilots were motivated by the idea that they were serving the Japanese emperor, widely regarded as a semidivine figure. The unofficial anthem of the Imperial Japanese Navy, Umi Yukaba, even had the following lines:
Across the sea, corpses in the water,
Across the mountain, corpses in the field.
I shall die for the Emperor.
I shall never look back.
(Leckie, 93)
To die for Japan's emperor and national security was considered a great honour and was closely tied with the idea of bushido. This was the name of the code of honour followed by samurai warriors, those martial experts who dominated Japanese warfare from the 10th century. Bushido is, in fact, a romanticised idea that was only developed in the 17th century, when samurai had already become largely ceremonial in function. In samurai literature of that period, it is frequently stated that bushido is 'a way of dying.' Whether true samurai were really as chivalrous as bushido suggests is irrelevant here, since the ideas the code promoted, such as austerity, loyalty, and self-discipline, were ideal for adoption by the kamikaze pilots of the mid-20th century.
Historian R. Leckie here summarises the pre-flight ceremonies of kamikaze pilots:
…[they] were hailed as saviours: wined, dined, photographed, lionized. Many of them attended their own funerals before taking off on their last mission. Farewell feasts were held in their honor…Solemn samurai ceremonies were conducted, and many toasts of sake drunk…the concept of the suicide-savior had so captivated the nation from schoolgirls to Emperor Hirohito himself that the slightest word of criticism would have been regarded as treason.
(18)
Kamikaze pilots famously wore a hachimaki headband of folded white cloth with the rising sun of Japan's national flag in the centre. The hachimaki symbolised perseverance and courage.
Despite the propaganda that exaggerated the effectiveness of kamikaze strikes, it did become difficult to find volunteers towards the end of the war, as recounted here by Captain Nakajima:
At the beginning we were able to select from the large number of people who volunteered. But as the war situation deteriorated and when the attack planes had to take off from Japan proper, when Japan itself was under attack, we needed a large number of Special Attack pilots. And then it could not be that all of them were volunteers but may have included those who did not actually desire to volunteer and those who were sort of dragged in by their comrades and persuaded to volunteer.
(Holmes, 493)
Officially, all kamikaze pilots were volunteers, but in practice, as noted in the above quote, coercion existed to various degrees. Nevertheless, many pilots did go willingly on their one-way mission, their imaginations captured by the romance of it all, as expressed here by one kamikaze pilot:
When I fly the skies
What a fine burial place
Would be the top of a cloud.
(Leckie, 187)
Others volunteered to make the ultimate sacrifice but were not overjoyed at the necessity, as one pilot wrote:
I say frankly, I do not die willingly. I die not without regret. My country's future leaves me uneasy…I am terribly distressed.
(ibid)
There were, too, an increasing number of cases of pilots who returned to their base with an excuse of some sort for not carrying out their mission, for example, poor weather obscuring the target, losing their way en route, or experiencing a mechanical failure.
The Form of Kamikaze Attacks
The first kamikaze group was created by Vice Admiral Onishi Takijiro (1891-1945) of the 1st Air Fleet. He formed a unit of 24 volunteer airmen. The first ship to be struck by a kamikaze pilot was the heavy cruiser HMS Australia on 21 October 1944, although those on board did not realise the crash had been deliberate. Australia was part of the US fleet in the Philippines. Kamikaze missions were first identified for what they were four days later in the Battle of the Philippines, when Japanese pilots attacked the escort carriers USS Santee and USS Suwannee.
In these missions, volunteer pilots deliberately flew their aircraft, which were typically modified to carry a heavier-than-usual bomb load such as a single 551-lb (250-kg) bomb, directly into targets like warships. Mitsubishi A6M Zeros were most commonly used; indeed, around 650 Zeros were used in kamikaze missions throughout the war, although any type of aircraft could be so deployed, especially obsolete ones incapable of defending themselves anyway against the newer Allied fighters. More rarely, Nakajima B5N torpedo bombers were fitted with massive 1,760 lb (800 kg) bombs, while the twin-engined Mitsubishi G4M bomber was used to carry a single Baka bomb (see below). Better fighters were often deployed to escort the slower kamikaze aircraft to their final destination.
The reason why fighters were used for kamikaze missions much more than other types of aircraft is here explained by Captain Tadashi Nakajima:
The reason was that Japan had fewer and fewer bombing planes, attack planes, and we had to rely on fighter planes. However, of course, fighter pilots were not trained in bombing attacks and therefore it was felt that the only way to solve this was to have these fighter pilots ram themselves, plane and body together, into the enemy ships.
(Holmes, 485).
Any target belonging to the enemy was considered legitimate. The most highly prized target was aircraft carriers, but the air defences of these and other large warships meant they were rarely sunk or even badly damaged. A much more common target was ships that could not defend themselves, such as fuel tankers. Even hospital ships, contrary to the Geneva Convention, were targeted. The hospital ship Comfort was struck in April 1945 by a kamikaze plane, an attack that killed 30 and wounded another 33 on board, many of them patients.
Rockets, Boats, & Submarines
Kamikaze attacks did not just employ fighter planes. There was the Baka bomb, a small aircraft propelled by a rocket system (but still piloted to its target by a human), which contained a nose packed with 2,600 lbs (1,200 kg) or more of explosives. The name Baka, which was the US servicemen's nickname using a Japanese word for this device, translates as 'idiot'. The Japanese themselves gave these suicide machines the more poetic name of ohka ('cherry blossom') or jinrai ('thunderbolt').
The Baka bomb was taken to its target, attached to a mother plane, and released to make the last 12 miles (19 km) or so on its own. The Baka bomb could reach an impressive top speed of 580 mph (933 km) in a dive, which made it difficult to shoot down, but this was also a weakness, since it meant the pilot had great difficulty controlling its direction. Baka bombs, first used in action in March 1945, were not particularly successful, as, for example, at the Battle of Okinawa, only one Allied ship was sunk by such a weapon.
Other kamikaze methods included hitting enemy ships using small boats packed with explosives, midget submarines, and human torpedoes. The explosive motor boat, called by the Japanese Navy Shinyo, meaning 'sea-quake', varied in length from around 16 to 21 feet (5 to 6 m). A variation was the similar-sized Maru-ni, which dropped depth charges to damage enemy submarines.
Midget submarines were used by many navies during WWII, but the Japanese navy employed kamikaze versions. The Kairyu ('Sea Dragon') measured 56 feet (17 m) in length and was operated by two men. The larger Koryu ('Scaly Dragon') measured 86 feet (26.2 m) and had a crew of between two and five men. These submarines delivered torpedoes at close range or had their bows packed with explosives for direct contact with an enemy ship.
Finally, human torpedoes, which again were employed by other navies, were adapted for kamikaze missions. Called a Kaiten ("conger"), the torpedo was enlarged to permit a man to sit upright and see through a small coning tower from where he could direct the aim of the weapon. Human torpedoes were deployed for the first time in November 1944 and in the Battle of Iwo Jima, and again at Okinawa. Although they did claim some enemy shipping, none of the above methods were particularly successful.
Successful Defence Against Kamikaze Attacks
The kamikaze attacks were extremely difficult to counter, not least because it was not always clear in the heat of action that an aircraft or boat was going to be used this way. Lieutenant Frank Manson describes the problem:
…you can't tell what the pilot's going to do at the last minute, whether he's going to veer off, what his judgement is going to be like, whether he's going to try to hit the water-line, whether he's going to try to hit the bridge, or whether he's going to hit your ship or one close by. But it's a human bomb, that's what it is, and it's got a man's brain in it.
(Holmes, 493)
Kamikaze attacks were often performed in groups. Several planes would attack a single target, each one coming from a different direction and at a different angle of descent. Lieutenant Manson was on board the destroyer USS Laffey when it was attacked by kamikaze pilots (but not sunk):
This attack went on for seventy to ninety minutes…There were twenty-six planes that made suicide attacks against our ship and seven of the planes were shot down by our gunners and fifteen managed to miss the ship and we were actually hit, direct hit, by four.
(Holmes, 494)
Over the course of the Battle of Okinawa, around 1,900 kamikaze attacks were made on the Allied ships. These waves of attacks were called by the Japanese military kikusui or 'floating chrysanthemums', after one of the most treasured flowers in Japanese culture. Nevertheless, the Allies won this key battle of the Pacific War.
The battle to stop kamikaze pilots reaching their targets became more efficient over time as Allied fighter defence of shipping was better organised and more intense. Picket warships were deployed to use their radar as an early warning system for the main fleet to the rear. Anti-aircraft fire from the naval ships began to use automated gunsights that could follow fast-moving targets. Special explosive rounds with proximity fuses were developed, which literally blew the incoming aircraft out of the sky.
Allied bombers specifically targeted Japanese airfields, destroying the kamikaze planes before they could take off and ensuring the airstrips would not be operational again any time soon. This was a crucial development, since Japanese aircraft carriers were never used to launch kamikaze planes, although they did sometimes transport these aircraft from one land base to another. On top of all those advantages, the vital statistic was that Japan had hundreds of kamikaze aircraft, but they faced thousands of Allied fighters protecting their home ships below.
Assessment
Over 4,000 Japanese pilots died in kamikaze missions during the war. Ultimately, the kamikaze campaign was not effective. The Allies continued to push Japanese forces right back to the home islands. Overall, 47 Allied ships were sunk and 300 damaged by kamikaze pilots, but this number was relatively small in the grand scheme of the Pacific War. Eleven US aircraft carriers were struck by kamikaze planes during the Pacific War, but, thanks to excellent naval repair teams, most were back in action in just a few months.
Importantly, even if a kamikaze plane got through the defences and hit a warship, the typical bomb size of 551 lb and the fact it hit the target only at the speed the plane was flying (rather than the much higher velocity it would have achieved if dropped from altitude) meant that it was rare that a kamikaze pilot managed to penetrate to the lower decks and sink a larger ship. Most damage was limited to superstructures and upper decks, which could be repaired relatively quickly.
The kamikaze tactic was most successful early on, before the Allies realised pilots were deliberately crashing their aircraft even though they were undamaged. At the Battle of the Philippines, when kamikaze attacks were first used in significant numbers, 27% of the attacks caused damage to Allied ships. At the Battle of Okinawa, the last major battle of the war, the success rate had fallen to just 15%. Even those that managed to penetrate the defences typically damaged only minor shipping, such as fuel tankers, cargo vessels, and less well-defended support vessels, all of which could be much more easily replaced than aircraft carriers and battleships.
The most telling fact of all when assessing the effectiveness of the kamikaze missions is that Allied fleets were in no way impeded in their relentless encirclement of Japan. The flower of the Japanese military's youth had been expended for nothing. Allied victory in WWII came in August 1945, not from sea-level operations, but with the dropping of two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki from an altitude that kamikaze pilots would have struggled to ever reach.
