Surface and Destroy: The Submarine Gun War in the Pacific

11 Japanese Prisoners [Illustrations follow page 150]

11 Japanese Prisoners In the Hollywood movie Destination Tokyo, released shortly before Christmas in 1943, theatergoers were given a rare glimpse into the world of the “Silent Service.” The film, starring Cary Grant, focused on the fictional submarine Copperfin as it carried out a mission of reconnaissance for the Doolittle bombing raid on Tokyo. In one action sequence Japanese Zeroes attacked the Copperfin as it traveled on the surface through the Aleutian Islands. The Copperfin’s crew managed to shoot down the planes, but when one of the sailors tried to assist a downed Japanese pilot, he was stabbed to death. The submariners promptly retaliated by machine-gunning the pilot.1 The navy’s technical adviser for the film was none other than Mush Morton. As a reward for his outstanding patrol in January 1943, Morton was given leave in Hollywood while the Wahoo underwent refit at the Mare Island Navy Yard. Possibly influenced by Morton, Destination Tokyo reflected a common view of the Japanese as fanatics who preferred death to surrender. Although a stereotype, it was far from unfounded. The Japanese Field Code issued in 1941 bluntly declared: “Do not be taken prisoner alive.”2 The Japanese refused to ratify the Geneva Convention on the treatment of POWs partly on the grounds that such provisions would be entirely one-sided; Japan’s vice minister of the navy explained that his men had no concept of being captured.3 As an additional disincentive to surrender, the government informally warned that any prisoners of war returning to Japan would be executed. At the end of the war, the United States held only about 5,500 Japanese POWs.4 Admiral Charles Lockwood claimed that the Japanese Prisoners 147 Japanese “fought so long as they had a weapon and, even when found helpless in the water, refused to be rescued.”5 In his statement to the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, Admiral Charles Nimitz similarly referred to “the known desperate and suicidal character of the enemy” when explaining the reluctance of submariners to pick up survivors.6 There are abundant examples of Japanese refusing rescue by submarines. At least one involved the USS Haddo commanded by Chester Nimitz Jr., the Pacific Fleet commander’s son. After sinking a ship on the night of 21 September 1944, the Haddo’s crew tried to induce some of the forty or so Japanese survivors to come aboard. On two occasions the submarine’s spotlight trained on swimmers within six feet of the hull, only to watch the men sink and apparently drown themselves. The Haddo’s war patrol report recorded, “Got so disgusted we depth-charged one of them with a hand grenade as he went deep.”7 Those Japanese captured were often taken by force. On the USS Gudgeon, crewman Albert Strow recorded in a diary his role in the acquisition of a survivor for interrogation. Whenever the submarine got close enough to pick up a prospective prisoner, the Japanese would dive under the surface. As related by Strow, “Finally we flooded down to where the deck was just awash and with two sailors hanging on to my feet I was able to grab on to him and the 2 of us were dragged on board.”8 Submariners occasionally had explicit orders to obtain prisoners and formed swimming teams for the express purpose of capturing them.9 Japanese resistance to being captured did not result simply from a sense of duty; they also feared that they would be tortured and killed. Stories of alleged Allied atrocities circulated widely among the Japanese forces. John W. Clary, who kept a secret diary during his time on the Wahoo, noted, “It strikes me that the Japs are taught we will torture them so they prefer death instead.”10 After the USS Balao sank a trawler on 18 March 1945, the crew found that despite the freezing waters survivors were reluctant to be rescued. But, the patrol report noted, “when we put away the tommy gun, several began to clamor to come on board.”11 148 Surface and Destroy For many prisoners, their first introduction to submarine life could hardly have been comforting. They were invariably stripped in a search for concealed weapons and as part of the “delousing” process. Prisoners also had their hair shaved or closely clipped to prevent the spread of lice. Since this process could include shaving their pubic area, sometimes at gunpoint...