The Final Storm: A Novel of the War in the Pacific

  “I have been fortunate. The emperor has blessed me. I have had a long and healthy life.”

  “Yes, the emperor. He wants only the best for his people. We are his children, yes? We should all grow old like you and me, in the splendor of this wonderful house.”

  Hamishita heard the sarcasm in Hata’s voice, wasn’t sure how to respond. The field marshal pointed a single chopstick at the bowls spread in front of them, said, “Eat. This is more nourishing than cold rice. I know what kind of rations you have, what you give your patients. It is a tragedy for you not to be more ably equipped. A man who cares for so many should be well fed.”

  Hamishita obeyed, sliding soft noodles into an empty bowl, the steam from a warm broth bathing his face. He absorbed Hata’s words, thought, so, you know how little I have, down to the last detail? He wanted to ask about that, thought of so many young officers who had scoffed at his every request. But Hata was far too intimidating.

  “Thank you for this invitation, Field Marshal. I am grateful that you allow yourself a moment’s attention to my position in our empire. I am flattered.”

  Hata slurped at his own bowl, ignored Hamishita’s gratitude, seemed lost in thought. Hamishita looked closely at his friend now, saw the age. They were both in their mid-sixties, the hard life of a soldier showing in Hata’s face, the roughness of his hands. Hata looked at him now, said, “Have you been taking the training?”

  Hamishita felt suddenly self-conscious.

  “I was told my position as a doctor …”

  “Stop. I am teasing you. Must you be so serious? You were the same as a boy, always the wounded one, the one who took offense, the one bitten by the insults. These days I should be the one who never smiles. My army carries the wounds that are far more serious than what an old farmer’s dog could do. You and I carry wounds of happier times. I recall you falling from that old bent cherry tree. You broke an arm, your … left. I think we were both crying, and your father insisted that if there were tears, there had to be blood. I have always remembered that. There was wisdom in his cruelty.”

  Hamishita had tried to erase those kinds of memories, was amazed that Hata would recall them.

  “If I may ask, Field Marshal, why have you summoned me?”

  “Now you insult me. I have known you since we were in playpens, and I can feel your doubt, as though my intentions are dishonorable. My power and my rank causes me to be despised by everyone in my command, and today I merely seek out the company of an old friend. And would you please stop referring to me as field marshal? I need not be reminded that I command the entire Second General Army. But out there, this vast army that obeys my orders, there are not more than a handful of men who even know my familiar name. The emperor knows nothing of ten-year-olds making mischief in a farmer’s barn, or stealing cherries from an old lady’s orchard. I treasure those times, innocence and joy. Broken bones and dog bites. Very soon I shall enjoy that again, in another place. Those memories shall become reality again, as shall the best part of family. There shall no longer be sacrifice and pain and blood. Is that not what you wish as well? Would you not relish climbing that cherry tree? This time I would try to catch you.”

  Hamishita stopped eating, was uncomfortable now, began to see a hint of madness in the field marshal’s rant.

  “I … would very much like to enjoy my childhood again. Very much. But those days are gone. I have more … adult duties to perform. We all do.”

  “For now. Do not think for one moment that I do not take my duties here very seriously. I am honored the emperor chooses me for such a task. I spent so much time in his palace, enduring the twittering of all those neutered birds who flutter around him, so very careful not to say anything that might cause his heart rate to rise one extra beat. For so long the emperor treated me the same way, flowery kindness, rewarding my grand career with promises of great, lofty positions. Prime minister! How about that? If I had accepted that, then I too could become one of the fragile little birds. But I am a soldier. Forty-five years in this army, Okiro. That’s why I am here. There cannot be much more time and I must fulfill my duty the best way I know how. That is why they despise me, of course. I make them work. But the emperor does not control my every waking moment, and he cannot tell me that, for one pleasant pause in my day, I cannot spend my time with a very old friend, sharing a simple lunch.”

  Hamishita made a short bow of his head.

  “Please accept my apologies. But you are too famous and too powerful in this world for me to treat you as the boy I knew in Fukushima. You are a great hero to Japan. I know of your accomplishments, your career. I was so very proud of you, I cannot just toss that aside. When I learned you were coming here, I did not dare think you would even recall who I am.”

  “We all have our heroes, Doctor. I have followed your career as well. A long life in the army has its rewards, including sources of information. Look at you. You heal what I destroy. There is honor in that, far beyond what a soldier is trained to do.” He paused, more serious now. “I was sent to Hiroshima to fortify the city, to add one more bastion to what will become the emperor’s impregnable fortress. Such a duty does not result in friends, Okiro. At the castle, even now, they lurk in corners and curse my name, because I force them to be better soldiers. I order men to perform their duty, because if I do not, they will lie about and abuse slave girls. Yes, I am despised. But if there is greatness to my life, it will come in what I do now. Our time is very close, Okiro. We have been granted Divine Opportunity.”

  Hamishita saw a glimmer of fire in his friend’s eye, the soldier staring off for a second, absorbing his own meaning. But the doctor did not respond, wasn’t sure what his friend was referring to. After a silent moment, Hata said, “I have always believed in a war of attrition. The military has made many mistakes. But now that will change. The enemy is coming, and very soon he will walk right into our parlor, where the knives await. It is so completely appropriate that it should come to this. The emperor has blessed you, my friend. He has blessed all Japanese, all of us who stand on our own soil, who will share the blessing of opportunity to greet the enemy with a violent death. The Americans will bring their ships and they will land their soldiers on our beaches and strike us in our harbors, and they will rely on the successes they have had against inferior commanders on far-flung outposts, absurd battles fought by men who never had the resources to prevail. But look around you. Look at this city! You know of the training, you have seen it, certainly. Every Japanese citizen, every one! The Americans cannot endure such a foe. They have become accustomed to smothering us like rats in caves, they have butchered our banzai attacks, they crush our feeble defenses in jungles where no man should ever fight a war. There are those in the High Command who continue to believe that all those many islands, all those nations we have subdued are ours still, that any talk of an enemy invasion of Japan is pure folly. But here is truth, my friend. Our empire does not rely on territory, on so many square kilometers of land we have taken from savages. The Japanese empire is right here, on this land, and in these people. In you and in me. The enemy believes that he is gaining victories because he chases outgunned and overmatched troops away from places where we never should have wasted our resources. I find no fault with the Americans. They have responded to our foolish errors by striking back at us. Those in Tokyo who believed we could match their armament were fools. Where we will prevail is in the heart, the soul, the spirit of what this empire means. They advance toward our homes having no idea what awaits them. They have no understanding what will happen to them here. None! And that is where I draw my energy. My father was a samurai, as was yours. They would understand what I do here. They are watching us, fists raised, knowing what will happen next!”

  Hamishita felt the words engulfing him, the field marshal’s energy flooding the room. Hata shoved a bowl of the noodles aside, seemed disgusted by the wordly presence of something so mundane.

  “Perhaps you do not know all that is happening, my friend.
I do not fault you for that. You are doing good work, you are healing the sick. You even treat prisoners of war. There are those who would toss those American aircraft crews to the dogs, to have them ripped apart by enraged civilians. I would rather have them fit and healthy. Witnesses, Okiro. They shall be witnesses to what we shall do to their brethren. No one will say of us that we are savages. I am sickened by the brutality of some of our generals. It is one thing to eliminate vermin like the Chinese, or to make good use of the strong backs of the Koreans. But when a man stands to fight you, and you conquer him, he should not be abused for that. A soldier should die like a soldier, whether he is captured or whether he leads his men in a great victorious charge. Either way he is still a soldier. And I want them to know, all of them, I want them to see what kind of soldiers we are. Not just me, not just this army … but all of Japan. We are a nation who has risen on the shoulders of the samurai, the code of the Bushido is a part of all of us.” He paused, looked hard at Hamishita, smiled. “Physician. A man who heals the broken bodies. Your ancestors will be proud of you for your capable hands and your good heart. But there are many good hearts beating in this city and beyond. We are mobilizing the citizenry in every town, every city. Every man, woman, and child is being taught how to properly defend their country, and their emperor. A soldier is a better soldier when he is given the proper weapon. The same is true for everyone. A child, an old woman … they already have the spirit, the devotion to their country. But give them a weapon, teach them how to defend their country, and you have created an unstoppable force. I am one man, I can only do so much, but they sent me to Hiroshima because I do it well. I am truly excited by the future, Okiro. The entire island of Kyushu will become a bloody battlefield. In the countryside, farmers are being shown that precious gasoline does not merely drive a tractor. It makes bombs. They are being taught to create deadly traps for the enemy in every rice paddy, in every field. Every house can become a tomb. Imagine this. A home, armed with explosives, people armed with weapons. They are invaded by an enemy force, and by their own hand, the home explodes, the people inside ignite weapons of horrifying power. The enemy … he dies, swallowing his own blood. The civilian, the Japanese farmer, his wife, his child … they leave this life and move on with perfect honor. It is poetry, my friend. It is justice, and it is the legacy of this empire. I have never felt such enthusiasm for an attack. And the people! Their enthusiasm is most gratifying of all! Yes, the Americans are coming, and with them comes Divine Opportunity!”

  Hamishita stared at his friend with open-mouthed awe, saw the man’s hands shaking, the redness in his face.

  “What can I do, Shunroku? I will train, as you say.”

  “No. You will do what you have always done, my friend. There will be wounded, a great many wounded. Repair them, return them to the fight.”

  The request sounded mundane, Hamishita feeling left out of something far more important.

  “But … I want to do more. I want to help us win this war.”

  Hata sat back against a large cushion, smiled.

  “Of course you do. Your loyalty to the emperor is well known, far more than you might be aware. But we will not win the war. That was never a possibility, not after the attack on the American fleet, not after we inspired so much patriotism from that race of mongrels. Despite all the bluster of those generals in Tokyo, all the claims of our superiority in numbers and in arms, all those radio broadcasts convincing the people how we devastated the enemy in every fight, there was never any other way this war could end. Winning was never an option.”

  “I don’t understand. I thought …”

  “There is much that I cannot tell you. But four years ago, when the Americans were attacked, there were many among us who knew we had made a fatal error. The emperor … he might have known that as well. But in war the loud voices prevail, and the emperor was swallowed by those voices. They are there still, calling for empire and expansion, denying even now that the enemy is anything more than a fly, easily swatted away. Those people … those generals are fools.”

  “But if you do not believe we can win … why do we fight?”

  “Because we fight! Everything is the fight, my friend. Don’t you see? It is not important that we defeat the Americans. What matters more is that they shall never defeat us! This war shall end and the foolish generals on both sides shall be swept away by their incompetence, their grand designs. Entire armies will cease to be. It is history, it is nature, it is the way. From the ashes new samurai will come, and Japan will rise again and be as she has always been. Oh, the war will end, make no mistake. The guns will fall silent, and all sides shall bury their dead, and there will be mourning and outcries. But no matter any of that, Japan will not lose. Our emperor is eternal, our empire is eternal. Armies come and go, men die, some with gracefulness, some with shame and cowardice. But Japan will always remain. That is what the Americans do not understand. I know something of their culture. They care a great deal about winning. But they will soon learn that wars do not decide winners and losers. Wars are where the honorable go to die, where the samurai meets his just fate. It does not matter that Tokyo has been burned, that our cities suffer their bombs. There is only one victory that is important, and no matter how many men must die, that victory will be achieved. The people know this, they are responding as I had expected. In every place I have been, every place where the training is taking place, even now, as we sit here, the people are rising up for the honor of Japan, for the blessing of the emperor, for the permanence of the empire. That, Doctor, is why we fight.”

  The lunch had not settled well in his stomach, and the long walk to his home had passed with more than one quick jaunt into the brush. All along the road, there had been many people, all on foot, going about their business with a kind of sad urgency, not quite the raucous enthusiasm for the fight that Field Marshal Hata had seemed to believe bathed every corner of the island. But in the fields Hamishita had been surprised to see assemblies, civilians gathered into formations, just as Hata had described. Not far from his clinic he had passed by a schoolyard, stopped, curious, watching a group of women, a hundred or more, young and old, standing in rows, attentive to the instructions from a soldier. Most carried bamboo poles, sharpened into spears; others held farm implements. But they obeyed the drills with increasing precision, while to one side another soldier called out the chants, the cheers, infusing them with the same astounding spirit Hamishita had heard from the old commander. He had seen children as well, a long column marching down the road past him, grim-faced boys mostly, holding broomsticks and tree limbs up on their shoulders, mimicking the march of riflemen. As he drew closer to his clinic, he had seen familiar faces, a group of old men, listening to a raucous lecture from another soldier, an officer Hamishita had treated in his clinic. The sounds of the mobilization seemed to grow in every crossroads, through every field, the great mission assigned to Field Marshal Hata taking place in every corner of the island, all across the city. Hamishita watched it all, slowed his journey home to absorb what Hata had driven into him, the pure and simple inevitability of what would happen when the Americans came.

  He was close to the clinic, his attention suddenly drawn by low thunder. He turned, knew it was another bombing raid, the sounds rising up from south of the city. There are many factories there, he thought. The Americans have no lack of targets. The question rose in his mind now, as it had for many weeks. The Americans bring their bombers with perfect regularity, and yet I have never seen a response from the Imperial Air Force. The anti-aircraft fire is there, always, and sometimes, as today, the gunners are fortunate. He thought of a book he had read, translated from German, a gift from a friend who had traveled to Europe at the start of the war there. He had been fascinated by the exploits of the man they called the Red Baron, had read many stories of the other great aces who flew in the first Great War. We have men like that, surely. The government tells us of great victories in the air, of so many enemy planes shot out of the sk
y. Finally I saw it for myself, those bombers. And that was truly glorious, watching those huge machines break into pieces, fire and smoke. And parachutes. But we fire so much ammunition from the ground, and so much is wasted, so little success. Where are the Zeroes? It has been so long since they flew past here, great flocks roaring overhead, flying out to meet the enemy in some other place. Am I not supposed to think about this? Am I not supposed to wonder if the war has come to Japan because we have no way to prevent that? There was so much cheering about our conquests, all the islands, the great lands, the Philippines, China, Australia, even America. It was all to be part of the emperor’s great destiny. Why has that changed? The Americans have driven our empire back to us, and my friend tells me it is all part of his plan. Hata says we are inviting them into our parlor. But would it not be better if we could destroy them in some far-distant place? Must our cities suffer, the old and the sick, too many for me to care for? He tells me my job now is to return the wounded to the fight. How many wounded will that be? How long will the fight last?

  He had thought often of Tokyo, the horrific ravages of the firebombing that had destroyed so much of the grand city. His wife had gone there often, was there now, seeking out relatives, caring for the injured, a task that by all accounts had grown obscenely difficult. Years ago they taught us to fight the fires with buckets, he thought, long lines of citizens hauling water by hand. It seemed like the right thing to do, preparing us, organizing us to deal with a burning building, or a block of homes. But a city? Tokyo was a firestorm, and the men with buckets were swept away like so many pieces of straw in a bonfire. The government did not tell us that. I only know because my wife was there to see it. Officially, that disaster never happened. How many people were lost … unofficially? How much of what we are told is simply wrong? Hata is my friend, and he chose to share his thoughts with me. I should be honored by that. He is an important man, respected, even by the emperor. He surely knows what he is talking about. He surely knows what is best for us. He would not lie to me. Certainly he believes what he says. Can I?