LT Onoda’s Thirty-Year War
9 MARCH 1974
LT ONODA’S THIRTY-YEAR WAR
In August 1944, a young Japanese 2nd LT in training, Hiroo Onoda, reported to the Futamata Army Training Squadron at the Nakano Military School. Over the next five months, he learned the guerrilla warfare tactics of the “Pacification Squadrons,” special Japanese commando units inserted behind enemy lines to disrupt and harass. On December 31st he arrived on Lubang, Philippines, a six by eighteen-mile island twenty miles northwest of Mindoro. Mindoro had fallen to the Allies in mid-December, and the Japanese garrison on Lubang had been ordered back to Manila–replaced by Onoda’s 110-man Pacification Squadron. On 3 January Onoda watched an American flotilla bypass Lubang on its way to the Linguyan Gulf. Onoda and his squadron reasoned they were now cut off and on their own.
Rice and supplies quickly ran short and morale among the Japanese soldiers deteriorated. By 28 February, when a US Marine battalion landed on Lubang, those who remained had largely lost the will to fight. In four days, the Marines killed or captured about half. The rest fled to the impassably jungled hills. At Japan’s surrender in August, leaflets were dropped that included a copy of the Japanese 14th Army surrender document. However, this, and later news of the total capitulation in September, did not sway the 50 or so Japanese hiding on Lubang, and it was not until April 1946 that most surrendered. Now only LT Onoda and three companions remained; CPL Shoichi Shimada, PFC Kinshichi Kozuka and PFC Yuichi Akatsu.
Trained in propaganda and the ways of the insurgent, Onoda convinced himself that the repeated messages left for him by Philippine and American authorities were tricks. At Futamata, Onoda had been conditioned to expect a 100-year war, and he and his small band steeled themselves for such a fight. However, in the Spring of 1950, a discouraged Akatsu drifted away and surrendered. On 7 May 1954, Shimada was shot and killed by a Philippine Army search party. Onoda and Kozuka “fought” on, gathering intelligence and holding out against an ultimate Japanese victory. Incredibly, they misinterpreted news of the Korean and Indochinese wars, the emergence of China, and the revitalization of the home economy as evidence of Japan’s continued aggression–on an economic front. The two evaded search parties, discounting as “fakes,” notes, photos, and family memorabilia left for them. In short they convinced themselves that the 100-year war was underway. Then on 19 October 1972, Kozuka was killed by farmers while stealing rice. Onoda held out alone until this day, when disheartened but not demoralized, he surrendered to a free-lance journalist who had come to Lubang for that purpose. He was surprised to return to Japan a hero, having become a cause célèbre during his 30-year war.
Watch for more “Today in Naval History” 15 MAR 22
CAPT James Bloom, Ret.
Associated Press. “A Former Japanese Soldier Returns to his Personal Battlefield.” San Diego Union-Tribune, 21 May 1996, pp. A-14, A-26.
Onoda, Hiroo. No Surrender: My Thirty-Year War. New York, NY: Kodansha International, 1974.
ADDITIONAL NOTES: Though Onoda is the last known Japanese soldier to surrender, his story is not one in isolation. Similar hold-out soldiers had been discovered earlier in Guam and on other South Pacific islands.
Onoda escaped capture by keeping constantly on the move through remote jungled regions not frequented by locals. He stole food, clothing, matches and batteries from farmers. As such, his presence, indeed even his identity as a WWII soldier, was known throughout his “fight.” The locals referred to his band over the years simply as those “mountain devils.”
