KAMIKAZE PILOTS OF WW2

I will try not to make this page to "dry", but here are some facts about the history. Again a page under constant construction.

Kamikaze means "devine wind" and was originally a name given to the typhoon that saved Japan from the Mongol invasion led by Kublai Kahn in 1281.

15.july 1944 Allied forces captured the island of Saipan, and the strategic base there.

From there B-29 superfortresses could reach the Japanese mainland.

The following is taken from "wikipedia.org. (just because i couldnt have written it better myself ;) )

The First Air Fleet commandant, Vice Admiral Takijiro Onishi decided to form a Kamikaze Special Attack Force; Onishi became known as "the father of the kamikaze".

The first kamikaze attack took place 21 oct. 1944.

The flagship of the Australian navy, and the heavy cruiser HMAS Australia was hit  off Leyte island.

During ww2, the japanese soldiers had an ideoligy to do anything for the emperor. -A little like the samurai there was no honour in getting captured alive.

The pilots were pilots that were all voulenteers and gladly dived their planes onto certain death trying to destroy allied ships approaching the japanese mainland. -preferrably aircraft carriers and alike...

When Commander Asaiki Tamai had asked a group of 23 student pilots to join the special task force, all of them had raised both hands in the air.

They held honour, respect, chivalry, tradition,courage in high regard, and are still respected and admired by soldiers all over the world.

Some would say that they were brainwashed, and i can to some point agree. -but the fact remains that the japanese soldier in general, and kamikazeīs in particular are still held as some of the bravest soldiers in the world, over 60 years after....

HERE is an example of the letters to their parents kamikaze pilots wrote home before their last flight.

(First thing i thought reading this, was: most 23 year oldīs today wouldnīt write a letter like that....)

I have read several articles about Kamikaze pilots and many of them state that the threat of many thousand planes set aside for protecting the japanese mainland, was one of the reasons that truman decided to drop the atomic bomb.