Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm editor Kandis Skipson, joined my staff writer Jane McGrath.
Speaker 1: Say they're candas Jane. My fiancy Stewart loves to watch
Speaker 1: war movies and if they're in black and white, even better.
Speaker 1: He's crazy about them. And some of my most favorite ones.
Speaker 1: I don't know the titles as well as he does,
Speaker 1: but the ones that are, you know, really seemingly authentic.
Speaker 1: But then Japanese soldiers are speaking in English, you know.
Speaker 1: And yeah, yeah, I love subtitles about as much as
Speaker 1: the next guy, So it doesn't frustrate me too much
Speaker 1: that I have to listen to Japanese soldiers speak in English.
Speaker 1: But I think that for the sake of authenticity, subtitles
Speaker 1: would have been better. That's true. And actually it's funny
Speaker 1: if you mentioned movies because the topic we're talking about today,
Speaker 1: I have a lot of favorite movies that are based
Speaker 1: around this course situation. Uh, if you've ever seen like
Speaker 1: Father Goose or Heaving Knows. Mr Ellison also old movies. Uh,
Speaker 1: they're really interesting because they're set in the Pacific on
Speaker 1: islands when um, they're American troops are on the Pacific
Speaker 1: and they're fighting Japanese and these very um obscure and
Speaker 1: remote islands in the Pacific and they have no connection
Speaker 1: to anywhere around them. I can't imagine it would be
Speaker 1: like being on a totally different universe, yeah, or a
Speaker 1: plan of existence really, because you're you're in the jungle,
Speaker 1: so you feel almost like you're reduced to it a
Speaker 1: different state of human being at that point. And we're
Speaker 1: living off the land, You're you know, having to flourish
Speaker 1: for food, you're having to watch out for for all
Speaker 1: the wild animals. That wouldn't even be like being part
Speaker 1: of society. Yeah, it's interesting. And what we're talking about
Speaker 1: is a situation that happened in World War Two. The
Speaker 1: US was fighting against the Japanese, and as you know,
Speaker 1: the US is very far from Japan and um in
Speaker 1: order to stage bombings or like have a base for
Speaker 1: which to for which to fight the Japanese, the Americans
Speaker 1: needed to get control of the huge number of um
Speaker 1: of islands in the Pacific, and so they needed to
Speaker 1: one by one take over these islands. And the Japanese
Speaker 1: knew that this was what they were doing, and so
Speaker 1: they fought fiercely to keep these islands and keep the
Speaker 1: US off them. Specifically, we're talking about places like Guam
Speaker 1: in Midway and the Philippines, and the Japanese strategy was
Speaker 1: put as many soldiers on these islands as conceivably possible
Speaker 1: to keep the Allies off because the problem was that
Speaker 1: the Japanese couldn't compete with the amount of weaponry that
Speaker 1: the American forces had. That's right, the American and the
Speaker 1: Allies in general were advancing much faster, and so UH
Speaker 1: one of the Japanese UH commanders came up with the idea, well,
Speaker 1: we have all these old fighter planes that are really
Speaker 1: out of date. We don't really have the resources right
Speaker 1: now to update them. What if we made them into
Speaker 1: human bombs. So, in essence, the Kama Kaze pilot was created,
Speaker 1: and their mission was quite simple. Fly a plane with
Speaker 1: these balls ums loaded on them into an Allied chip
Speaker 1: and complete a suicide mission, but also take out a
Speaker 1: vast number of Allies. That's right, and it's hard to understand.
Speaker 1: I mean, we do have the modern equivalent today of
Speaker 1: suicide bombers, but in Japan, UM the leaders who wanted
Speaker 1: to convince their soldiers of this had a very good
Speaker 1: tool to convince them to do this. And this was
Speaker 1: this idea of bushito. If I'm pronouncing that correctly, um,
Speaker 1: and it was a code. It's a pretty interesting uh
Speaker 1: code that was developed originally in like the Middle Ages
Speaker 1: and associated with samurai fighters and um or warriors, I
Speaker 1: should say. And the code is means the way of
Speaker 1: the warrior and uh it's dressed military skill and but
Speaker 1: also um, aside from military skill, just like a way
Speaker 1: of life, even modest living, honesty, especially honor itself. Right,
Speaker 1: and this was incredibly important to creating an atmosphere of
Speaker 1: peace throughout Japan. But then by around the eighteenth century,
Speaker 1: Japan wise and askince a peaceful country and the samur
Speaker 1: I didn't have a lot more to do, and so
Speaker 1: the code still very much existed in people's minds as
Speaker 1: a legacy of Japan, but it wasn't really being put
Speaker 1: to use. And so when the idea came up that
Speaker 1: a kama Kaze pilot could you know, fulfill this this
Speaker 1: code and and have bushido and this honor bestowed upon
Speaker 1: him for his country, people jumped at the chance. That's right,
Speaker 1: and a special part of this was to express loyalty
Speaker 1: and just like unflinching sacrifice. And this was a key
Speaker 1: point here because in death basically you get honor and
Speaker 1: in that in that culture, death can actually make up
Speaker 1: for for disgrace in life, right, And I think if
Speaker 1: you look at the stats, only about five percent of
Speaker 1: of these soldiers just surrendered to online forces during the war.
Speaker 1: That's how incredibly important honor is, That's right. And like
Speaker 1: like we said, movies, like I've seen plenty of POW
Speaker 1: movies full of Americans in British and they all they
Speaker 1: were people who surrendered to the Access forces. But the
Speaker 1: Japanese were not like that. You know, we didn't have
Speaker 1: camps and camps of PWU Japanese because they would rather
Speaker 1: die than surrender exactly. And I think that as we'll
Speaker 1: see when we talk about some of these Kama Kaze
Speaker 1: pilots in just a minute, we'll see that some of
Speaker 1: them would have favored death over the disgrace and shame
Speaker 1: of living and knowing that they let their country down.
Speaker 1: So we know that they started using these Kama kaze pilots,
Speaker 1: and we know that the Pacific Islands were incredibly important strategically.
Speaker 1: And here's where the story gets really interesting. So all
Speaker 1: of these different Japanese soldiers who are staged in these
Speaker 1: Pacific islands, they're upholding the same code that the Kazi
Speaker 1: pilots with this coat of mashito and an honor. So
Speaker 1: they go into the very dense Pacific jungles and they
Speaker 1: stay there and they wait and when a battle comes,
Speaker 1: they fight it. When a skirmish breaks up, they participate.
Speaker 1: But otherwise they're on their own, living in the jungle,
Speaker 1: that's right. And a lot of them were advised to
Speaker 1: you know, hold out basically and um and stay alive
Speaker 1: until reinform ssmans come. And that's where we get the
Speaker 1: name for these people. They were called holdouts for stragglers.
Speaker 1: And they were called stragglers because when the war ended
Speaker 1: in Japan surrendered, they didn't get the memo, that's right.
Speaker 1: And um, when the Allies took over an island, the
Speaker 1: Japanese knew that the US was known for for just
Speaker 1: scouring the island and taking out the Japanese, whether you know,
Speaker 1: killing them or or just capturing them, which of course
Speaker 1: would be a disgrace to them. Um. And so they
Speaker 1: were very skeptical when they were told to come out,
Speaker 1: even if when they were told the war was over,
Speaker 1: the Allies were telling the truth. In Japanese were understandably skeptical,
Speaker 1: right precisely, And so many of them continued to stay.
Speaker 1: And they're in Pacific island strongholds, and they would survive
Speaker 1: off the land. There there was one soldier who wasn't
Speaker 1: an island near Russia, and he stayed there until nineteen
Speaker 1: And there was another group that actually included a woman,
Speaker 1: that made their own little society. They made their own clothes,
Speaker 1: they hunted down food, they forged, they even made wine
Speaker 1: out of distilled coconut jeers. Well, if you can imagine
Speaker 1: that one said story that came out of this was
Speaker 1: um this group but in seclusion. I think this is
Speaker 1: a separate group from the one you just mentioned. But
Speaker 1: um one straggler came out and emerged only because his
Speaker 1: group had turned to cannibalism. And so you can see
Speaker 1: how incredibly desperate and dire these situations were, again all
Speaker 1: for honor and upholding the chido. And I think that
Speaker 1: without argument, the two most famous stragglers are a Noda
Speaker 1: and Yukoi, and they didn't come out until nineteen seventy
Speaker 1: four in nineteen seventy two, respectively. That meant twenty eight
Speaker 1: and thirty years holding out, either thinking the war was
Speaker 1: not over or whatever, just you know, stuck in their own,
Speaker 1: their own world. And I wonder if they last concept
Speaker 1: of time. I mean, if you were in a jungle
Speaker 1: with no other sense of communicating with people, I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: at first you would you would count the sun rises
Speaker 1: in the sunsets, and you would know how many days
Speaker 1: had passed. But after that many years, I mean, I wonder,
Speaker 1: and not only that, to be on the defense of
Speaker 1: the entire time, to still be and a warlike mindset,
Speaker 1: knowing that any moment the enemy could spring upon you.
Speaker 1: And not just that, but you know, on the other side,
Speaker 1: you're looking nearver your shoulder for a wild animal just
Speaker 1: out to get you too. And so at this point
Speaker 1: there were lots of missions conducted to get the holdouts
Speaker 1: out of the jungle, that's right. And when Yokai he
Speaker 1: was the first one who really came out um out
Speaker 1: of these two men. Uh, he was on Guam, the
Speaker 1: island of Guam, and for twenty years. And when he
Speaker 1: did come out, it was revealed that he did actually
Speaker 1: know the war was over, but because of the Japanese
Speaker 1: sense of pride and and the idea of shame, he
Speaker 1: was pretty ashamed to go home alive when he when
Speaker 1: he went over there to fight, and so many of
Speaker 1: his comrades died exactly. And I believe a direct quote
Speaker 1: from him was, I am ashamed I have returned alive,
Speaker 1: that's right, And he said um, like as a soldier,
Speaker 1: I was taught to prefer death to disgrace of getting
Speaker 1: captured alive. Right. And so we're talking about people who
Speaker 1: had been informed every way, you know, their troops, Our
Speaker 1: troops knew how. We're talking about notes being dropped from
Speaker 1: helicopters into the jungle, messages being blared through loud spakers,
Speaker 1: you know, conal the war is over. And a Noda
Speaker 1: who held out into nineteen seventy four, he came back
Speaker 1: as a national hero. Yeah, since his is a really
Speaker 1: interesting story. I think he was on the island of
Speaker 1: lou bang and Um, which is only seventies four square
Speaker 1: miles um, and he was there for thirty years, like
Speaker 1: we said, um, And he was one of those ordered
Speaker 1: to hold there until reinforcements arrived, and he also believed
Speaker 1: that the war was still going on. Like you said,
Speaker 1: even despite these leaflets, he thought they were tricks, they
Speaker 1: were propaganda to get him to come out, um, and
Speaker 1: it wasn't. And so he didn't know that the war
Speaker 1: was over, and he believed the Allies would brutally kill him,
Speaker 1: um if he did so, he didn't want to take
Speaker 1: his chances. And he actually he wasn't the only one
Speaker 1: on the island for much of that time who like him.
Speaker 1: He was a part of a four man band of
Speaker 1: stragglers as well. And um, they eventually broke up, but uh,
Speaker 1: by nineteen fifty, the first member gave himself up. And
Speaker 1: when he did find out, hey, the war is over,
Speaker 1: he tried to to warn the other three guys. They
Speaker 1: didn't believe him. Um, even after the leafless were sent
Speaker 1: and uh, you know, they were sending broadcasts their speakers
Speaker 1: into the jungle, he still don't believe them. Um. The
Speaker 1: three men were convinced it was a lot basically, And
Speaker 1: so they were still fighting. And I found that really
Speaker 1: interesting that they still had ammer amma on them. They
Speaker 1: were being grill of fighters basically, and they were literally
Speaker 1: continuing the war. And so when he came home. His
Speaker 1: general attitude upon finding out that not only had Japan
Speaker 1: surrendered in the war, but even the section on the
Speaker 1: military to which he belonged, that section have been disbanded.
Speaker 1: I mean he had he was a decorated hero, but
Speaker 1: he belonged to no military. And I think his attitude
Speaker 1: was one of, well, what's worth living before? You know?
Speaker 1: This concept that I've spent the last however many years
Speaker 1: of my life upholding it no longer exists in essence,
Speaker 1: that's true, and it's interesting like their stories, like when
Speaker 1: he comes back, it was a huge story, obviously, and
Speaker 1: when he met his parents, it was interesting to me
Speaker 1: that his parents were still alive, and I thought to myself,
Speaker 1: a wide, didn't they go to the island if they
Speaker 1: knew who was there? And I looked into it. It's
Speaker 1: because he was actually officially declared dead in nineteen fifty nine.
Speaker 1: They really thought he was dead, and his parents did
Speaker 1: actually go there for a time, um and send these leaflets.
Speaker 1: But because of minor typos Onnata thought, oh, it's a
Speaker 1: it's a clue. They're they're being forced to do this,
Speaker 1: and they put in these typos to warn me not
Speaker 1: to actually believe it, and UM also and so they
Speaker 1: thought he was dead by fifty nine, but then by
Speaker 1: seventy two, UM evidence showed that he was alive and
Speaker 1: one other of his bandmates were alive as well. UM
Speaker 1: and he he was actually killed the other the other
Speaker 1: person in his group where it was killed in the
Speaker 1: skirmish with the police because he was still fighting the war. UM.
Speaker 1: And so search parties went out for Anata and they
Speaker 1: actually left gifts for him at at one point and
Speaker 1: not actually left the thank you note for the gifts,
Speaker 1: and so they knew for sure he's alive, you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: UM and uh. So finally in nineteen seventy four, it
Speaker 1: was a student by the name of Suzuki who um
Speaker 1: who saw it. Nada out to convince him to come
Speaker 1: out of hiding, and so we found him. Eventually did
Speaker 1: find him, and still Nonada was like, no, I'm not coming,
Speaker 1: I'm saying where I am, and I am going to
Speaker 1: continue to until someone, uh Mike's commanding officer ors me
Speaker 1: not to. So Sinceuki did just that, he found uh
Speaker 1: not his old commanding officer. I think his name is
Speaker 1: ton of Gucci. He was like a bookkeeper at the time.
Speaker 1: I think, and so he convinced him to go over
Speaker 1: to Anada to say and deliver a formal address saying
Speaker 1: lay down your arms blah blah blah, and Donata was
Speaker 1: still reluctant, but he finally did go back to Japan.
Speaker 1: It sounds like a work of fiction. I know. I
Speaker 1: think this would make a better movie than The Castaway. Well,
Speaker 1: we're gonna get on that right now. And I think
Speaker 1: Jane's going to direct, because she's obviously very well would Yeah,
Speaker 1: so she's quite a movie buff. Any any movie questions
Speaker 1: to recommendations you want from her, and she's just happy
Speaker 1: to do that too, as we are, always to answer
Speaker 1: your questions about history or maybe even to fulfill requests
Speaker 1: for a certain topic you'd like to hear on one
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