Japanese Destroyer Captain / World War II / Captain Tameichi Hara, Fred Saito, Roger Pineau / AllNavyBooks.com

Pearl Harbor, Guadalcanal, Midway––the great naval battles of the Pacific, as seen by Japanese eyes. One of Japan's most famous naval heroes of World War II, Captain Tameichi Hara––"The unsinkable Captain" tells of his battles with the allies in World War II. The book has been credited with correcting errors in U.S. accounts of various battles and with revealing details of high-level Imperial Japanese Navy strategy meetings. The author, Captain Tameichi Hara, was a survivor of more than one hundred sorties against the Allies. Called the workhorses of the navy, Japanese destroyers shouldered the heaviest burden of the surface war and took part in scores of intense sea battles, many of which Captain Hara describes here. In the early days of the war victories were common, but by 1943, the lack of proper maintenance of the destroyers and sufficient supplies, along with Allied development of scientific equipment and superior aircraft, took its toll. On April 7, 1945, during the Japanese navy's last sortie, Captain Hara managed to survive the sinking of his own ship only to witness the demise of the famed Japanese super-battleship Yamato off the island of Okinawa. A hero to his countrymen, Captain Hara exemplified the best in Japanese surface commanders: highly skilled (he wrote the manual on torpedo warfare), hard driving, and aggressive. He maintained a code of honor worthy of his samurai grandfather. Hara also gives credit to Japanese and "enemy" officers whose daring and seamanship were proved in the savage and often bloody Pacific battles. He was critical of himself and his senior commanders. The books popularity over the past forty-six years testifies to the author's success at writing an objective account of what happened that provides not only a fascinating eyewitness record of the war, but also an honest and dispassionate assessment of Japan's high command. A "best seller" in Japan, this Ballantine paperback edition is very difficult to find. 311 pages, 13 black and white photographs and 9 maps. The book has an appendix but no index. Cover on this paperback shows wear from folding––see photo.

Fair + + + Cond. --- $19.95

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"Captain Hara discusses how he commanded a Japanese destroyer in all of the major Pacific sea conflicts during World War II: Empress Augusta Bay, Coral Sea, the invasion of the Philippines, Guadalcanal, Savo Island, and Midway. While on a re-supply mission through Blackett Straight in August 1943, upon noticing a fire-ball explosion near the destroyer "Amagiri" in front of his destroyer "Shigure", he ordered for his ship's crew to shoot at Lt. John F. Kennedy's sinking PT-109. He provides a most harrowing description––as commander of cruiser Yahagi ––how he barely survived its sinking alongside the ill-fated battleship Yamato on their suicide mission to attack the U.S. forces invading Okinawa. He details his training of the pilots of suicide motorboats (Shinyo: "ocean shaker") that were designed to ram Allied warships approaching Japan. After I wrote to him, he sent me an autographed photograph of himself in 1968––a fine keepsake from one of the luckiest Japanese destroyer commanders to have survived so many desperately fought WWII sea battles. His 312-page book was initially published by Ballantine Books in 1961." William Garrison Jr.

"Hara is the last samurai. He objected to compulsory suicide as official doctrine, because he saw this as a violation of bushido values. He turned pacifist BEFORE the Bomb. His personal doctrines demonstrate why the Japanese lost the war––they were inflexible; he wasn't. His doctrines were "Never ever do the same thing twice" and "If he hits you high, then hit him low; if he hits you low, then hit him high," the latter a maxim of MacArthur's, too. Hara criticizes superiors for using cavalry tactics to fight naval battles; never understanding the implications of air power; dividing their forces in the face of enemy forces of unknown strength; basing tactics on what they thought their enemy would do; and accepting a war of attrition with a foe more capable of maintaining it. His technical discussions are superb. What gives the book significance is his explication of strategy/tactics and their implications. Hara is a brave man who knew WHY he did what he did. This puts him in a minority, in any navy." James H. Sutton