Hiroo Onoda Passes
A story from CNN tells of the passing of Lieutenant Hiroo Onoda, a Japanese soldier who followed his last orders and held out in the jungles of the Philippines for nearly three decades until convinced the war was in fact over. Even after he was initially found, he refused to believe the war was in fact over, relenting only when his former commanding officer returned to inform Lt. Onoda that he was no longer subject to the orders he had been given 30 years before.
In 1944, Onoda was sent to the small island of Lubang in the western Philippines to spy on U.S. forces in the area. Allied forces defeated the Japanese imperial army in the Philippines in the latter stages of the war, but Onoda, a lieutenant, evaded capture. While most of the Japanese troops on the island withdrew or surrendered in the face of oncoming American forces, Onoda and a few fellow holdouts hid in the jungles, dismissing messages saying the war was over.
While extreme, his case was certainly not unique. Sergeant Shoichi Yokoi held out on Guam until 1972–28 years after the battle which liberated that island. Private Teruo Nakamura held out for even longer. I remember seeing pictures of Sergeant Yokoi after he was found, and wondered how an island like Guam could allow him to hide for as long as he did, or how he could have lasted as long as he did.
And while they were all (former) enemies of our country, one can’t help but either admire, or at least give grudging respect, to a man whose dedication and tenacity enabled them to last in the face of impossible conditions. It’s folks like these who held out on islands across the Pacific and in isolated pockets for years after the end of the war.
He returned to a hero’s welcome in Japan, but even after a pardon from then-president Ferdinand Marcos, the citizens of Lubang were not so eager to forgive, even to the point of demanding reparations when he returned in the mid-1990’s. But despite all of this, he never thought that he was doing the wrong thing, once saying, “I became an officer and I received an order. If I could not carry it out, I would feel shame. I am very competitive.”
RIP, Lieutenant.
Category: Blue Skies
He returned to Lubang at the invitation of the local government I believe, and made a donation that was used for scholarships.
I feel badly for the people who got killed though.
I don’t see why we should respect an individual who killed unarmed civilians. There is nothing honorable in that despite whatever factors of loyalty and dedication there might have been. A war criminal is a war criminal
I admire his stubbornness and dedication. Sayonara, Onoda-san.
Honorable foe.
I can absolutely respect that kind of courage and sacrifice. RIP
Dude was a scumbag.
Rolling around killing unarmed Filipinos. I don’t care if that was SOP for the Imperial Army. I’m not going to celebrate the service of such a scumfuck.
Did he personally kill or have his men kill unarmed Fillipinos? Either doing or after the war? Or did he hide out the entire time?
At any rate, this guy is a prime example to throw into the faces of the revisionists who wring their hands about us dropping the big one on Japan.
Jap soldiers were thoroughly indoctrinated shits that you had to exterminate. The savagery of the Island fighting showed them to be ruthless foes who gave and took no quarter.
Imagine the sheer numbers of American casualties if we would have had to take Japan itself with millions of fuckers like him defending it.
This was an enemy to respect, an honorable foe. My generation has faced cowards and scum in our current wars, but this man held to his convictions and his duty to follow orders. RIP LT, “Readily will I display the intestinal fortitude required to fight on to the Ranger objective and complete the mission, though I be the lone survivor”, this enemy of ours lived that stanza of the Ranger creed. He fought on to complete his mission for decades! You may not approve his mission, but he had the intestinal fortitude to give all to his mission’s completion.
This guy sounds like one of the neanderthals that inhabit this blog.
Thank god for the atom bomb. This mentality was a small piece of what we were up against.
10-true. And while I won’t admire him for what he’s done, you have to look at the society in which he was raised–fealty to the Emperor and the Japanese Empire to look at how men like Lt. Onoda came to be. He even admits he “brainwashed” himself that the war wasn’t over until he was ordered to stand down by his former commander.
But in the end, it no amount of dedication to the empire allowed him to survive as long as he did. Will to survive, yeah.
And vwp–there’s the fucking door. Hit it. All fucking speed. Repeatedly.
I’ve read plenty of accounts of how WWII Japanese Soldiers chose to commit Seppuchu, ritual suicide rather than surrender, which to them was the ultimate dishonor to their Ancestors, family, and their Emperor, they had no mercy at all for civilians, either, one book I’ve read”The Knights of Bushido” chronicles War Crimes they committed, like lining up blindfolded civilians and using them for bayonet practice, cannibalism of US POWs, or in what was then the Dutch West Indies, where they went through hospital wards bayoneting every patient. I respect his dedication and mettle, but I despise what he and his comrades did! The use of the A-bombs saved millions of American and even more Japanese lives, because the Military Junta that had the Emperor overridden at the time was indoctrinating, mobilizing, training, and equipping Japanese civilians to fight to their deaths once we invaded Japan.
@9 VWPunk, the Internet troll who all too frequently inhabits this blog.
Go away, bedwetter.
@8, honorable?
Bataan Death March participants and the rest of south east Asia who were tortured, raped, enslaved, and became medical test subjects of the Japanese Imperial Army would say otherwise. The guy was a fanatical scumbag and that’s why we are even talking about him. His pardon by a terrible dictator should have said it all already.
Story title should have been “less evil in the world today”.
I have heard that when some of these guys surrendered their weapons were whistle clean and no rust, uniforms shabby but clean and mended
@9 Hey, VWPissant! You made a post in proper English, with correct grammar and no misspelled words! This can only mean that you got your mommy to type it for you. She must be ashamed to have whelped a turd such as yourself. Seriously, fuck yourself sideways, eat shit, and die.
I will give him a thumbs up for his loyalty and survival skills, remarkable. I recall reading about him when this hit the news media in 1974. I believe it was all in print back then, no Google stuff.
My dad was in the 11th Airborne, New Guiana and the Philippines Campaigns. They were training for the assault on Japan when the war ended. We had only talked about our experiences once, after I came home from Vietnam.
A few things he said I’ll always remember from that discussion was: On the line one night, someone (groggy?) saw someone approaching in the dark and fired. He shot his own brother. The next morning that sad individual helped bury his brother. For whatever reason the brother had went forward to relieve himself.
He said being under heavy machine gun and infantry fire he was trying to remember what the instructors had told him to do. Re: I wished I’d paid more attention.
After Leyte’s fall. He and another trooper (most likley others) had to recover their fallen comrades where they were recently buried in the field and move them to the American Cemetery. More but end of this.
Invasion of Japan. Did some research on this. 11th Abn. would have been held in reserve for the commanding generals commitment after D-day. Wherever he would have needed them.
Now Mind you: This would have been the second Island invasion of Japans Homeland. The first would have been Kyshru. The largest southern most island.
OK my spell checker quit working for whatever reasons.
Perhaps if my dad had been on that fourth landing I might not be here posting here now.
Proud to be an American Military member.
Oh, bye the way we can’t forget VWP can we? VWP? Is that something like dumping kitty litter? Just wondered as I don’t like to step into VWP stuff
Yes, he’s still hanging out in mommy’s basement. Perhaps he’s become an internal respectable of all he has blown out
I read about this guy a number of years ago. I have forgotten where, and the details are fuzzy, but I was not favorably impressed. As an intelligence officer, trained in guerilla warfare, he did a remarkably piss-poor job of affecting the American war effort. He did do a fairly good job of murdering unarmed civilians and running from anyone who was armed.
Honor? He failed miserably at accomplishing his mission and didn’t have the courage to face reality or do anything other than preserve his own miserable life. His blind obedience and refusal to accept reality were typical of the Japanese military of the time and is the reason we needed to use the atomic bomb.
I was at a Philippine Cultural event a few weeks back, and was showing some of the elderly gentlemen in attendance some of my father’s photos from Manila (1947 -1947). The older Filipinos despise the Japanese, and for good cause. Several of these men said their fathers were executed by the Japanese for not cooperating. And for all of the idiots that say we had no justification for Hiroshima and Nagasaki, pick up a copy of The Rape Of Nanking, then get back to me when you finish reading it.
They committed atrocities, we nuked them and won.
If you think the Chinese would have been kind to the Japanese if the tables had been turned, think again. American experience fighting in Asian countries since WW2 has always been marked by routine brutality committed by the enemy that are war crimes under the GC.
VWP: “pussy” is a shorter and more accurate name for you. I suggest you post under that name.
Reading about Japan’s preparations for the defense of the home islands makes me greatful we nuked them and ended that damned war. Had we been forced to invade, the costs would have been unthinkable.
Japan had squirreled away more than 3000 airplanes, and sufficient fuel and armaments for them. Tens of thousands of troops were held in reserve.
But the training for the civilians was unbelievable. There were entire groups of civilians who were trained to use a weighted belt, a small air bottle and a mask. They were given a sturdy bamboo pole with an explosive charge on the top of it. Their job was to wade out into the water when the landing craft were being launched and await their approach. When the craft came overhead, they were to detonate the charge and sink the vessel. And die.
That entire country was being prepared for a mass battle of attrition, of national seppuku and I am happy it never came to that. Not for their sakes, so much, as for ours, and the rest of the civilized world.
We can respect someone without liking them. This would be one of those times for me.
Not respecting the capabilities of the enemy gets folks killed. Yeah, like Pearl Harbor and our borders today.
0311, I am not justifying or defending war crimes or actions taken, I am giving the soldier and warrior the respect his Commitment to mission deserves. The world lost a true warrior with his passing.
Concur–I don’t respect WHAT he did, particularly regarding his dealing with the civilians on Lubang after the war, but I find his tenacity and adaptability certainly worthy of note.
Even his own culture has “declined” to the instant gratification level since the 1940’s, much like ours has.
No words of admiration for the man himself, but the dedication and tenacity he showed was something any soldier in any country can respect. Minus the inhumane behavior he and his compatriots were known for, his field skills and devotion to duty are indeed worthy of admiration and something every soldier should strive to emulate.
I find it interesting that there are voices here totally disgusted with any positive word spoken on his behalf, are not some of those voices the same ones who would be comfortable with wholesale slaughter in Afghanistan in order to bring the enemy there to it’s knees? Interesting hypocrisy that.
@8 and the others – I can respect the tenacity and courage of the Japanese soldier. I cannot, however, forgive the atrocities routinely committed (Nanking, Bataan, etc.) nor that while only about 3% of Allies captured by the Germans died in captivity, over 60% captured by the Japanese died (roughly 16,000 out of 25m,000 if memory serves.) It’s said that realpolitik caused us to conveniently ignore that after the war.
Me, I shed no tears for Hiroshima or Nagasaki. They reaped what they sowed.