Tag: Pearl Harbor

On Children in Wartime

In 2016, Time magazine published a story that recognized the 75th anniversary of the entry of the United States into World War 2. It did so by recalling the stories of several children whose lives were directly affected by that war, children who witnessed the war first-hand, and children who, as adults, were still alive and sharing those tales when the article was written. And the stories these adults told of their experiences in wartime still resonate today, now more than 80 years after the US entered the war.

Take the story of Walter, a boy who was 13 when he witnessed the power of modern warfare first-hand. Walter tells of feeling an explosion of bombs so close to him that it almost knocked him down, even though he was almost half a mile away from the blast. He then recalled how, later that day, the long procession of coffins, each one containing the body of one of the dead in them, the dead who had been the targets of the bombing, were brought past his house. And he clearly remembers the blood splotches that were clearly evident on and stood out against the yellow-white of the coffin wood as they passed, stacked high on the back of military trucks.

Then there’s the tale told by Edwin who was 14. He was eating his cornflakes one morning when he saw the planes fly low overhead and then begin to strafe the targets on the ground below them. He was fascinated and horrified at the same time. It seemed like a movie to Edwin; surely, humans couldn’t willfully bring such violent destruction to other humans in this way, he remembers thinking at the time. He then remembers the countless nights of blackouts, of building a bomb shelter, of hoping–no, praying–that if he hid under his bed when and if the planes returned, that the mattress would be thick enough to stop the bullets…

How about the tale told by a boy whose family called “Chick?” Chick was 12 when the war came home to him. He and his brother were making some spare change at a local cafe by washing dishes for the breakfast customers. A taxi driver stopped by for coffee and told the boys through the service window to the back that if they wished to see the war first-hand, to go outside and climb up on the roof of the cafe. That vantage point would give them a great view of some live war action. The boys did so. But what Chick saw frightened. him: Hundreds, he later said, hundreds of puffs of smoke indicating bombings and anti-aircraft fire. He took his brother and ran home. He yelled for his mother as the brothers entered the yard in front of their home. “Momma! It’s war!” he screamed. Sure enough, as soon as his mother ran out of the house at her son’s cry, a bomb screeched down and struck the neighbor’s house with an ear-splitting explosion. Chick knew the family next door was dead. The fire that resulted from the bombing quickly spread to all the houses in the neighborhood, including that of Chick’s family.

All three of these boys and many, many other children saw war up close and personal, witnessed death up close and personal. Today, in dozens of conflicts around the world, children are still forever changed by their personal experiences with warfare and the death and destruction that are caused by it. These American boys who spoke to Time 75 years after the fact, however, were slightly different than other American children during World War 2.

You see, all three of these boys were of Japanese descent and living in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, when the Japanese Navy launched their attack on Sunday morning, December 7, 1941.

On a Trip to Hawai’i

Hawai’i is one of the most beautiful places in the United States, and people from all over the world go there to enjoy the beauty of the beaches, forests, and the hospitality of the people. Asian tourists visit the islands routinely and have for decades. One such tourist from Japan was named Takeo.

Takeo’s desire to go to Hawai’i was so strong that he stayed several months. He arrived in Hawai’i in March of 1941, and he rented an apartment overlooking the harbor in Honolulu. Using that place as a base, Takeo wandered all over the island of Oahu, learning about its beaches and hills, and he took copious notes so he could remember all that he saw. Like many tourists, he enjoyed taking tours of the island by air. The view from above, he said, gave him a wonderful perspective on all that lay below.

Takeo enjoyed swimming in the harbor. He snorkeled there often, and he sometimes took the ferries and boats that chugged around the island. He mingled with the populace, shopped in the markets, and listed to their stories about life there. Over the course of nine months, Takeo learned all he could about the place. You could easily say that he was obsessed.

Today, almost 1/5th of the population of the state is of Japanese descent. When Takeo was there, the place housed about 160,000 people from Japan. That helped Takeo blend in better and made him feel much less conspicuous, much less of a “foreigner” in what was still at that time an American territory. When the United States entered World War II, the overwhelming majority of those Japanese people residing in Hawai’i chose loyalty to the United States over their native land. Fear of “the other” and racism led the United States government to implement a policy of internment for many Japanese-Americans on the mainland.

Takeo, however, had other ideas. You see, the reason he was so interested in Hawai’i was not that he was a casual but deeply attached tourist. No, rather, he worked for the Japanese government as a gatherer of intelligence. He was the chief Japanese intelligence agent in the American territory.

In fact, Takeo Yoshikawa’s copious notes and research that he radioed back to his home country over the nine months he lived in Honolulu helped Japan carry out the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.