Retribution: The Battle for Japan

I just finished reading Retribution: The Battle for Japan, 1944-45 by Max Hastings, a history of WWII in the Pacific. It took some time to slog my way through it. Hastings recounts many personal stories he gathered from letters and verbal histories, and I found it difficult to follow the flow of the overall history with all the jumping from one small story to another. Yet, I think these short, personal histories add to the understanding of impact of the war on the individual soldier.

One thought that struck me: why are generals often such egotistical leaders? Hastings makes the point that General MacArthur was so self-centered that his military usefulness was extremely compromised. I suppose it takes a certain personality type to lead a war effort that requires the death of men you are responsible for. Could it be that the quest for personal glory is a common attribute among such leaders?

I was also struck by the extreme nationalism and racist attitudes of the miscarried bushido culture in Japan. It’s almost impossible to imagine, and yet, it’s apparent that even today there are fanatical, warrior cultures willing to use suicide to accomplish their purposes.

Finally, I was interested to read Hastings’ account of the use of weapons of mass destruction. He clearly traces the change from precision (a non sequitur in WWII) bombing to area bombing to incendiary bombing. Single bombing raids that caused more than 100,000 casualties (like the Tokyo raid on March 9-10, 1945) were being used long before the use of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, so whatever military, political, and moral dilemma there may have been about huge numbers of civilian casualties had already been decided before use of the atom bomb.