50th Anniversary Of Japanese Mass Suicide Noted

For the last 50 years, Masa Aihara has burned incense sticks before a photo of her dead husband, Fumio.

Today marks the 50th anniversary of Fumio’s death in one of the most spectacular suicide actions of World War II.

As Japan’s plight grew increasingly desperate in the war’s closing months, the remnants of its navy, including the Yamato, the world’s largest battleship, sailed knowingly with no air escort into a swarm of American fighter planes.

Fumio was killed along with almost 4,000 other sailors on 10 ships.

“Americans should have known Japanese (facing defeat) have no choice except to kill themselves,” Aihara says.

Officers on the ships in the battle group, called the Special Surface Attack Force, were under orders to sail to Okinawa and beach their vessels. The official plan was to abandon ship and swim ashore to join the soldiers fighting against American invaders.

But the sailors knew, from the mission’s name, they would not be going back home. A “special attack force” was the designator for suicidal “kamikaze” attacks.

“Once a Japanese decides to do something, they must stick to it,” Aihara says, her eyes moistening. “There is no other way.”

The battle group was led by the Yamato and included a cruiser and eight destroyers.

Shortly after the ships reached open seas, American torpedo bombers attacked and quickly sank them all. The remnants of Japan’s once-formidable imperial fleet were wiped out in a single afternoon.

Some survivors and families of victims recently gathered for a memorial service above the sunken wrecks of the battle group about 50 miles south of Kyushu, Japan’s southernmost main island.

Shinto priests in flowing white robes chanted solemn prayers in front of an altar as the chartered boat circled the spot where the sailors lie entombed on the bottom of the sea.