Twilight of the Gods: War in the Western Pacific, 1944-1945 (The Pacific War Trilogy Book 3)

by Ian W. Toll

Pacific War histories have tended to underplay the controversy created in Japan, and even in the military ranks, by the introduction of organized suicide tactics. Many Japanese resisted strongly, arguing that it misconstrued traditional samurai warrior ideals (bushido). Some naval officers associated the concept with a pathological “death cult” that held sway in the Japanese army, and they argued that it had no place in the navy. Veteran aviators, recalling the victories they had won in the skies earlier in the war, tended to regard kamikaze attacks as essentially defeatist. Now and again, Japanese pilots had crash-dived into Allied ships, or rammed Allied bombers in flight—but before the fall of 1944, such attacks had been sporadic and opportunistic, often occurring when an airplane was damaged and could not return to base.