This essay is based on testimonies given by Okinawan survivors of the Battle of Okinawa many years after the event. To view the testimonies, please click the page links at the top of the page OR the links below after each section.
Warning: Most of the testimonies depict graphic events related to war.
On April 1st, 1945, the United States armed forces made their way onto the beach just west of Naha, the capital city of Okinawa. This started one of the bloodiest battles of the Pacific War, The Battle of Okinawa. It was also referred to as “The Typhoon of Steel” due not only to the ferocity of the fighting, but also to the large amount of kamikaze attacks. Throughout the 82 days this battle lasted, most of the island became a battleground and none of the indigenous Okinawan families were safe from the suffering caused by both the Allied forces and the Imperial Japanese Army.
Although Okinawa was officially made a prefecture of Japan in 1879 and the Okinawans had gained the right to vote in 1912, the Japanese still didn’t recognize the Okinawans as Japanese civilians. For example, Okinawan students attending university in other areas of Japan faced discrimination. Despite this, the majority of Okinawans stayed loyal to Japan and the emperor. During the battle the Okinawans were left to fend for themselves, and some were robbed and displaced from their hiding places by Japanese soldiers (Kerr). Some were even executed as spies for speaking in their native dialect.
In order to prove that Okinawa was loyal to Japan, the Japanese government drafted young men and women. They created two differnet goroups in order to include younger Okinawans in the war; the Blood and Iron Corps and the Lilly Corps. The Blood and Iron Corps focused on middle school aged children, forcing boys as young as 14 to “volunteer” to fight alongside soldiers. The Lily Corps was made up of students and teachers from the Okinawa Women’s Normal School and the First Prefectural Girls High School, who were mobilized as a nursing group. Out of those who participated, over half of the Blood and Iron Corp and about 220 (80%) of the Lily Corp students perished during the fighting (Angst 2).
For those who survived, the horrors they experienced were unimaginable and unforgettable. Interviews and testimonies of survivors give us a glimpse into the horrors that they had to face on a daily basis, such as watching their friends die, being sent to the front lines to fight, or the daily struggle to survive. Although the testimonies only offer one view of an event, the Okinawan people offer a unique perspective of the war.
The Lily Corps were briefly trained as nurses and accompanied the Japanese soldiers into the caves that were used as hiding places. The students were under the impression that the war would be over in a matter of days and were in no way prepared to face the horrors of the prolonged fighting. According to Miyagi Kikuko, one of the Lily Corps students, they had expected to be far away from the fighting and “…wrap the men in bandages, rub on medicine, and give them shots as [they] had been trained,” which was further from reality than they ever could have imagined (Cook 355). Depending on their assignment, the Lily Corps students were required to hold down limbs of Japanese soldiers as they were amputated, remove dead bodies from the caves, pick maggots out of wounds, or go outside of the caves to find food and water. The students were malnourished, filthy, and in some cases injured or sick. However, they were still responsible to fulfill their jobs for as long as possible. Eventually, as Japanese defeat became imminent, the students were disbanded and left to fend for themselves. Left with no guidance and kicked out of the caves, many girls committed suicide or were caught in the crossfire between the Japanese and American forces and were killed. Those who could move attempted to find safety elsewhere, and some attempted to drag their injured friends to safety. Unfortunately, in the end only about 20 out of 240 students survived.
“The stench of rotting flesh was unbearable. At night, when it was quiet, I could actually hear the maggots wriggling out of the bodies.”-Tsuneko Kinjo
To read more testimonies from the Lily Corps students click here
The Blood and Iron Corps were the male counterpart to the Lily Corps. Officially, their jobs were to deliver messages and other communications as well as transporting supplies. However, towards the end of the Asia-Pacific War these students were put on the front lines alongside the Japanese soldiers. Because they had little training, a majority of them died. To put it simply, the boys became pawns that the Japanese forces used to prolong the battle for as long as possible.
“Although we set out swearing to remain together, whether in life or death, I lost all track of them. I couldn’t walk any longer. I crawled on my belly to the place where today they put up the Memorial to the Vigorous Youth. There was a well there, the only one in the area. So many people were piled up in it that they were floating on the surface.” -Ota Masahide
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As well as mobilizing children, the Japanese and Okinawan governments had a negative effect on the islands’ civilians. The Japanese army kicked them out of caves they had taken shelter in, stole food and supplies, and, both indirectly and directly, caused the demise of 130,000 to 140,000 Okinawan civilians, which was more than one-fourth of the original population (Hein 13). The Japanese Army ordered large groups of civilians to commit “group suicides” out of loyalty to the Emperor, since being captured by enemy forces was considered more disgraceful than death. With no weapons at their disposal, groups of islanders were forced to slaughter one another with sticks, rocks, string, and even their bare hands. Japanese soldiers also considered Okinawans speaking in their native dialect as disloyal, and in some cases executed them for minor offenses. The Japanese considered Okinawans “…insidious because of their difference from ‘true’ Japanese…”, and were often suspected as being traitors (Hein 15).
“My memory tells me the first one we laid our hands on was Mother. Those who had blades, or scythes, cut their wrists or severed arteries on their necks. But we didn’t do it that way. We might have used a string. When we raised our hands against the mother who bore us, we wailed in our grief. I remember that. In the end we must have used stones. To the head. We took care of Mother that way. Then my brother and I turned against our younger brother and younger sister. Hell engulfed us there.” –Kinjo Shigeaki
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With such violence directed towards them from both sides, it is hard not to wonder why they collectively decided to remain a part of Japan. Even before World War 2, Okinawans faced severe discrimination at the hands of Japan, whom they considered their equals and protectors. Japan had attempted for years to strip them of their language and cultural attributes in order to “remake” them as Japanese (Hein 13). The war on Okinawa was also prolonged long after Japanese defeat was imminent to wartime leaders, which caused many more unnecessary deaths of the islanders. The remembrance of the Battle of Okinawa differentiated immensely between the Japanese and Okinawans, mainly due to the atrocities the islanders suffered due to the abuse and negligence of the Japanese.
The fact that survivors can remember the Battle of Okinawa in such precise details years after the war ended goes to show how traumatic and impactful this event was on their life. Each of these interviews have taken place over 40 years after the event, in some cases prompted by outsiders such as Haruka and Theodore Cook, where others willingly offered their stories as a way of educating and preventing Japan from joining another war. People remember trauma differently, and those who study posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have found that the most common ways people remember trauma come in the forms of intrusive recollections, nightmares, flashbacks, and psychophysiological reactions to reminders of the event (McNally 105). Many of the Lily Corps survivors reported having nightmares for years after the battles, seeing dead classmates or even being temporarily transported back to the battle, with smells, sounds, sights and emotions returning to haunt them. Many survivors’ memories fall under the “intrusive recollections” category. These are involuntary thoughts about the event, and the memories come suddenly and disrupt daily activities such as work or school. In most cases, those who experience some type of trauma remember it differently than others involved. In the instances of the Japanese army and the Okinawans, the Okinawans tend to remember the violence they faced at due to the Japanese or events caused by the Japanese, whereas the Japanese tend to recall more about the feelings of fear and helplessness they felt because of the ongoing battle.
Testimonies, although one-sided, offer the world different perspectives on events. In the case of the islanders, their testimonies offer a narrative that is largely unknown to the world outside of Okinawa and Japan. In most textbook accounts from the United States, the Battle of Okinawa is only mentioned briefly because America wanted to gain possession of Okinawa solely for its strategic befit, and never mentions the vast destruction the battle wrecked on the island. Even most Japanese textbooks fail to mention the Okinawan’s point of view of the war. With oral histories, although possibly altered by time or outside sources, the world is given a glimpse into the world of the Okinawans during the Battle of Okinawa. With their perspective in addition to other wartime accounts, readers are able to construct a clear picture of the effects of the Pacific War.