General Santos, on the tip of Mindanao in the south.
Posted on 05/26/2005 8:12:52 AM PDT by AmericanInTokyo
Edited on 05/27/2005 12:51:25 AM PDT by Sidebar Moderator. [history]
Just only a quick blurb in the top news segement today, but Mainichi News reports that two elderly Japanese men in their 80s have turned themselves into or otherwise presented themselves to Japanese authorities in the southern Philippines in Mindanao, apparantly "surrendering" or at least talking to them, after holding our for nearly 60 years in the Philippines following Japan's WWII defeat.
A remarkable story if true.
Japanese-language Mainichi news story is linked. It is unclear what their Imperial Army unit was, if they knew the war had ended, and other details. They were said to be talking now with Japanese officials in a hotel on the island of "General Santos".
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UPDATE!
The latest from what I can tell (3:00 a.m. Eastern Time Friday, May 27, 2005). And by the way, thank you for your kind comment.
A veteran of the Pacific War living in Saitama Prefecture in Japan, a "Teraishi san", who works with the War Survivor's Group, collects the remains of fallen Japanese soldiers. He is in his mid 80s.
He received a call from another man who is married to a woman in the Philipines, who was working to collect word in a forested area in Southern Mindanao. It was only yesterday that Terauchi received this international call from the Philippines which was rather frantic.
The woman had apparantly crossed into or had been in Muslim extremist controlled territory and had heard throught Moro fighters of the existence of "two elderly men from the Japanese army". Further, she got the information that they wanted to get out and passed it on to Japan, where it got to Terauchi.
Terauchi of course worked with the Japanese government who, through the Embassy in Philippines, to get the information.
There are still some survivors around from those days (much as WWII survivors are in the States), and they still look out for their own. Terauchi was in tears in the interview, saying the men were afraid of "Japanese Military Court Martial" if they returned to Japan, but of course he urges them to get back to Japan. This is from Yomiuri news. It is in Yomiuri, Mainichi, Fuji, NHK, Asahi, you name it.
I'll try to post any links to Japanese TV about this. The Moderate might also put (UPDATE) after this thread title if they could do so. Done.
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Families of the men in Japan are reported as amazed, shocked and ecstatic.
In the case of (Sgt?) Nakauchi, his sister thought he was dead all these years. She stated that even before the WWII ended, they received a report he was killed, and they even "received his remains" after wards (ikotsu, literally, 'bones') and had buried him and it was all behind them.
They even had a funeral service when the 'body' was returned to the town, but since it was not recognizable I suppose they would have no way of knowing. At any rate, they want the men home ASAP.
Yamakawa's brother said "he sure hung in there," and expressed the same thoughts.
Nakauchi's mother died some 23 years ago. The Japanese authorities had given notice to the family in June 1945 that Nakauchi had been killed. Nakauchi's relative said that if the mother were alive she would be very happy.
Nakauchi's 'gravesite' can even be visited in Kochi Prefecture. It just says his name and rank, and "June 15, 1944, Killed in the War, 28 years old" on it. By the way, I'm getting that the men apparantly are not both (83), but one I believe is 87 and the other 85--so the age might have been an inaccuracy.
War buddies of the two men, a few still around, such as one fellow in Hiroshima, a "Nagai" (84) only had reflective thoughts of how bloody their battles were and "well, that's amazing. 60 years. I want to say "yoku yatta" when he returns ('you really hung in there').
Another relative expressed some trepidation about returning after all these years, and the fact there may be Philippine families effected because (one or both, not sure) the men married locally there.
They must have finally gotten ronry, so ronry.
It might be a true story. Maybe... 60 years is a long time to E&E in a jungle.
General Santos, on the tip of Mindanao in the south.
see post 43 for Japanese Holdout Registry
Mindanao! Maybe we could tell them that Abu Sayyaf is at war with Japan and get a few kamikazis of our own!!
They were on Mindoro and engaged a patrol of Philippine Marines when I lived there. www.wanpela.com
March 5, 1974 - Lubang Island - 2nd Lt. Hiroo Onoda
Probably the most 'famous' of the Japanese holdouts, Onoda was the only survivor of a group of four. He surrendered 29 years after Japan's formal surrender, and 15 years after being declared legally dead in Japan. When he accepted that the war was over, he wept openly.
April 1980 - Captain Fumio Nakahira on Mindoro
Captain Fumio Nakahira of the Japanese Imperial Army, held out before being discovered at Mt. Halcon in Mindoro.
January 1997 - 85 Year old Sangrayban discovered on Mindoro
"WAR IS OVER An 85-year-old Japanese soldier has been found on the Philippine island of Mindoro. Going under the name of Sangrayban, he had been living among the Mangyan tribe for 54 years. He had a wife from the tribe who had given him four children and he was in very good health, according to Rufino Baldo, a member of a team searching for such Japanese stragglers. On Mindoro, Sangrayban was one of a group of soldiers who landed on the island in 1943 with orders "not to surrender under any circumstances". He thought that American leaflets dropped over the island in 1945 declaring that the war was over were a propaganda trick. After his companions died, he went native, living among the Mangyan tribe for 54 years. He married a Mangyan women and had four children. He has blocked out all his memories of pre-WWII Japan, but he still speaks an old fashioned form of Japanese. When discovered, he was in "very good health". He does not want to leave his sick wife and is unlikely to return to Japan." NOTE - This story was later proved to be a hoax.
ping
Maybe the Dems could use these guys for the upcoming Big Filibuster.
ping!
The Islamofascist kids of 2005 giving us a few headaches, are pitiful amateurs--they will be slaughtered to the last Koran-hugging, stinking, filthy one of them -- and indeed they are NOTHING compared to the old Japanese codgers who have still the bushido concepts of both the sword and the spirt, of 'giri', 'gaman' and 'jiko gisei'.
They probably decided to finally surrender when they saw the Republicans cave on the filibuster.
Marking for update.
Wow.
There were expected to be very resourceful.
I'm sure that they could have found a knife, broken bottle or a rusted can to disembowel themselves.
Oh, the shame of being captured would have been too much.
I hope they bought Sony and Toshiba back in '45...
And couldn't afford a plane ticket. Sounds reasonable to me.
Taking that long to surrender would make someone the French equivalent of the Japanese soldiers who holed up for decades on end.
The Bataan Death March began at Mariveles on April 10, 1942. Let's let these B@$tards reenact it.
I suspect it's a combination of the two -- they holed up, didn't find out about the end of the war until years after the fact, and then decided to just stay where they were and are only now changing their minds (because they're feeling too old to survive unassisted?).
If past incidents are any example, they will be cleaned up, fixed up by the medics, issued new replicas of their original period uniforms, and flown to Japan, where the Emperor will order them to surrender. The surrender will be taken by the highest ranking US officer in Japan, and that will be pretty much it.
If true, they followed their last orders (go guerilla, resist the Americans, fight on for the Emperor) for over 50 years. They will be treated with honor and dignity by our military throughout the process. Remember, these are Japan's MIAs.
Yes, and the example they provide of fidelity to Duty, Honor, and Country, should be highly respected.
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