Kamikaze

[Benoit Douville]

I have a question concerning the Kamikaze, Did Japanese Ace like Hirojoshi Nishizawa were asked for volunteer for it? What was the procedure to become a Kamikaze? Did they volunteer of forced to it?

[red devil]

After the fall of Saipan in July, 1944, Admiral Takijiro Onishi, commander of 1st Air Fleet in the Philippines, created the Special Attack Group of suicide dive-bombing pilots known as kamikazes. Young men were inspired to volunteer as they wished to die for their country. Pilots were trained in just over a week to fly their modified Mitsubishi A6M fighters.

The first kamikaze attack on enemy warships took place in the struggle for the Philippines in 1944. Kamikaze pilots aimed at the central elevator on carriers and the base of the bridge on large warships. As they had to fly at low altitudes they were very vulnerable to anti-aircraft guns. During April 1945 kamikaze pilots under Admiral Soema Toyoda launched 1,400 suicide missions as part of Operation Ten-Go. It is estimated that these suicide pilots sunk 26 ships during this campaign. More than 2,000 kamikaze missions were also flown against the US fleet at Okinawa (April-July 1945). By this time the US Navy had learnt how to deal with kamikaze attacks and few ships were hit.

Kamikaze pilots continued to be active until the dropping of the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Admiral Takijiro Onishi, the commander of the Special Attack Group, committed suicide when he heard that Emperor Hirohito had surrendered.

Hirojoshi Nishizawa was killed in action on 16th April 1944 BEFORE the creation of the Special Attack Group. He is credited with 87 kills.

[Benoit Douville]

Red Devil,

I appreciate the info. Do you know if some Japanese Aces participated in these suicide missions?

Regards

[Goldfish]

Nishizawa actually died supporting kamikaze operations:

This is from Henry Sakaida's Imperial Japanese Navy Aces 1937-45

The first successful kamikaze suicide attacks occured on 25 October 1944 when Lt. Yukio Seki and four other pilots attacked US carriers in Leyte Gulf. WO [Warrant Officer] Nishizawa had played a pivotal role in this mission by downing two patrolling Hellcats. He subsequently told his comrades that he would die soon, and requested a kamikaze assignment, although this was swiftly turned down because of his value as a fighter pilot.

On 26 October Nishizawa boarded a bomber used by the Navy's 1021 Transport Group and left Cebu Island for Mabalacat (near Clark Field) to pick up some replacement Zeroes. A frantic radio SOS was received from the transport, but it failed to arrive at its destination and nothing more was learned of its fate.

Like Nishizawa, most fighter pilots volunteered for kamikaze attacks, but skilled, experienced pilots were turned down because they were needed for defensive missions and for escorting kamikazes to their targets. Saburo Sakai was ordered on a kamikaze mission from Iwo Jima due to his lack of sight in one of his eyes, but nothing came of it and he was reassigned to defensive missions over Japan.

[red devil]

Nishizawa actually died supporting kamikaze operations:

This is from Henry Sakaida's Imperial Japanese Navy Aces 1937-45

The first successful kamikaze suicide attacks occured on 25 October 1944 when Lt. Yukio Seki and four other pilots attacked US carriers in Leyte Gulf. WO [Warrant Officer] Nishizawa had played a pivotal role in this mission by downing two patrolling Hellcats. He subsequently told his comrades that he would die soon, and requested a kamikaze assignment, although this was swiftly turned down because of his value as a fighter pilot.

On 26 October Nishizawa boarded a bomber used by the Navy's 1021 Transport Group and left Cebu Island for Mabalacat (near Clark Field) to pick up some replacement Zeroes. A frantic radio SOS was received from the transport, but it failed to arrive at its destination and nothing more was learned of its fate.

Like Nishizawa, most fighter pilots volunteered for kamikaze attacks, but skilled, experienced pilots were turned down because they were needed for defensive missions and for escorting kamikazes to their targets. Saburo Sakai was ordered on a kamikaze mission from Iwo Jima due to his lack of sight in one of his eyes, but nothing came of it and he was reassigned to defensive missions over Japan.

Why then have I found references to his dying in April 1944 before the Special Attack Units were even formed? In fact, this is the only site recorded on the net that mentions him or his record.

Nishizawa


Nishizawa, Hirajoshi; PO1/c-WO, IJNAF pil.
Citose kokutai, 4.kokutai, Tainan kokutai, 251.kokutai, 253.kokutai
87 kills 44/04/16 53,81 87 kills

Date KIA 16/04/44 I appreciate this may not be accurate, but with nothing else to go on?

[Goldfish]

I have no idea why they have that date posted, but is certainly inaccurate. The only thing I can think of is that he must have confused the date with someone else's date. I only know that Henry Sakaida's information is very reliable and he is considered one of the leading experts on WWII Japanese aviation, especially Japanese aces. Here is another site that gets the date wrong, but is closer to the mark:

http://users.accesscomm.ca/magnusfamily/ww2jap.htm

I will let you know if I come across any more pages concerning Hiroyoshi Nishizawa.

[mars]

Hirojoshi Nishizawa was KIA On 26 October when aboard a transporter, he flew one of those escort Zero for the first kamikaze attack on 25 Oct, and claimed 2 F6F shot down, when back from mission, he volunteered for kamikaze but was truned down, he was too valuable to be a kamikaze pilot ! Saburo Sakai never volunteered for Kamikaze operation, once he was ordered to luanched an attack to US fleet in a very bad weather, those Japanese aircrafts got lost, and Saburo found only his two wingmen still with him, consider continuning the attack would be suscidal, he descided to cancel the attack and flew back.

[TurkishTiger]

The first Kamikaze ploit was not Japanese but he was Bugliran.

Captain Dimitar Spisarevski was one of the many Bulgarian pilots, defending the sky above Sofia during the air-raids by USA and England in the World War II. In the words of his contemporaries, he was a man of unruly character and h e distinguished himself by his nationalistic views and his selflessness. Once he asked his pilot colle a g u es what they would do, if their airplane was damaged, they had no more munitions and they were wounded. All were silent and waiting the answer. Then Spisarevski went red in the face, clenched his fists and told them: I ll crash head on the enemy, this is our duty! We have the honor to die for our Fatherland! . There are lots of stories which could be retold about this great son of our Fatherland, but the most important is his self-sacrifice on the morning of 20 December 1943. During the serial American air-raids on Sofia, the strength supremacy of the enemies was overwhelmed. After his fuel was going to finish and he was wounded, he noticed the guide-plane of the enemies squadron and he did what he had once told his pilot colleagues he crashed in to the bomber and brought it down. This disorganized the rows of the other airplanes and they couldn t drop their deadly load over the capit?l. The Bulgarian National Alliance /BNS/ remember the heroism of our ancestors, who died for Bulgaria for over 13 centuries and respect them.

[Larry D.]

Mr. Tiger -


This is the THIRD posting of exactly the same fallacious paragraph in three separate threads on forum "Japan at War 1895-1945." Posting the same thing over and over and over again isn't somehow going to transform it from nonsense to fact through the application of deliberate repetition.