Pearl Harbor. Takuma Melber

Prologue

After fighting the heavy swell and bad weather in the north Pacific for several days, the Japanese aircraft carrier Kaga arrived in position in the middle of the vast Pacific Ocean an hour before sunrise on December 7, 1941. The loud rattle of the engine mixed with the roar of the waves. A Mitsubishi A6M2 fighter aircraft, later known as the Zero, sped down the runway, its propellers spinning. Next in line was Akamatsu Yūji’s plane.¹ Akamatsu was the observer-navigator in a torpedo bomber. The pilot, who was responsible for achieving a successful take off, pressed the button as usual to start the propeller engines and slowly maneuvered the plane into position. Akamatsu’s aircraft, a Nakajima B5N, had a heavy and destructive payload in the form of an 800-kg torpedo. If the take off failed, all three crew members risked being blown to pieces without having left the aircraft carrier. Akamatsu always screened out any thoughts of dying as the plane took off and reached its flying altitude. As in the earlier exercises, everything went perfectly on this occasion, and Akamatsu’s plane joined the 183 fighter planes and bombers in the Japanese aerial armada. “It must look like a swarm of bees,” Akamatsu thought to himself. The armada formed the first attack wave on the US Pacific Fleet lying at anchor in Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. For the time being, the commander had ordered radio silence, and Akamatsu could only hear the roaring of the engines many thousands of meters above the Pacific Ocean. He felt a deep inner calm, coupled with extreme concentration and a sense of exaltedness. He had little understanding of everyday political and diplomatic affairs, nor did he need any. He was a soldier, and his military training required only that he obey the orders of his superiors, who would know what was in Japan’s national interests. There was one thing he did understand, however: the oil embargo imposed on Japan by the USA jeopardized the success of the Japanese expansion on the Chinese mainland.

      The war, which had been waged there for several years, had become bogged down. Unlike the Russo-Japanese War of 1904/5, which saw the Japanese emerge as military victors but political losers, Tokyo’s political and military decision-makers no longer wanted to be dictated to by the Western powers. Of course, their ranks included not only warmongering “hawks” but also “doves,” who were attempting right up to the last moment to achieve a peaceful solution. Even as Akamatsu was flying towards the US naval base, Japanese diplomats were in Washington. But did they actually know anything of the war plans? Or was the attack meant to surprise Japan’s representatives in Washington as much as their American colleagues?

      Akamatsu’s plane broke through the cloud cover. In the distance he could see the island of Hawaii the pilot was steering towards. The hour had come that would bring Japan glory and honor. The message from Admiral Yamamoto Isoroku passed on at the briefing by the fleet commander still resounded in his ears: the attack on Pearl Harbor would determine the survival or destruction of the entire Japanese nation. If the plan – which was completely reliant on the element of surprise – were to fail, the war would be lost before it had even started.

Akamatsu and the men in the first Japanese attack wave were aware of the significance of their mission: the surprise attack had to succeed at all costs. As they overflew the coast of the main Hawaiian island of Oahu, the bomber squadron maneuvered into formation and headed directly for its target, Pearl City harbor, and the US Pacific Fleet anchored there. Just a few moments after the Japanese navy airmen had spotted the main US navy base in the Pacific, Akamatsu received a signal informing him of their target, the Tennessee-class destroyer USS California, commissioned in 1921. Before Akamatsu knew it, the pilot was diving towards the majestic-looking enemy vessel. When the steel colossus came into his sights, he pressed the button at just the right moment, as he had learned through the months of training, to release the deadly torpedo. At that moment the plane came under heavy anti-aircraft fire. Akamatsu felt as if the US fleet, which had been taken completely by surprise, was directing all of its anti-aircraft fire at him and his plane. While the pilot ascended desperately in an attempt to dodge the hail of bullets, Akamatsu heard a loud explosion, and a blast wave passed through his body. Or was he imagining it? When the plane was finally out of the danger zone, Akamatsu looked back at the scene from a safe altitude. Black smoke was billowing from the USS California; he was fairly certain that the torpedo had found its target and penetrated the ship’s hull. Akamatsu and his comrades had accomplished their mission. The crew were overwhelmed with a feeling of euphoria and spontaneously cried out a triumphant “Tennō Heika Banzai!” – Long live the Emperor of Japan! Akamatsu proudly set course for the aircraft carrier Kaga.

The aerial attack on Pearl Harbor on the morning of December 7, 1941, sent a shockwave through the USA and plunged Japan into a world war with fatal consequences. The military struggle between the Japanese Empire and the United States of America for hegemony in the Asia-Pacific region had begun, and it would not end until the surrender of the Japanese armed forces in the summer of 1945.

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