MCB HAWAII -- Bowing his head, former Japanese Imperial Navy Zero pilot Lt. j.g. Kaname Harada led a moment of silence for a fallen colleague while touring Marine Corps Base Hawaii June 3.
Harada stood along Reed Road near the Olina Child Development Center, visiting the believed crash site of Japanese Imperial Navy Lt. Fusata Iida, commander, 3rd Aircraft Group.
“I didn’t see Lt. Iida crash,” said Harada through translator Dan King. “But according to the men who returned, the engine aircraft fire was intense, and Iida’s [plane] suffered damaged.”
Harada is one of several surviving Zero pilots who flew for the Japanese Imperial Navy during several World War II historic events, including the Battle of Midway. He visited the crash site and other base landmarks with several members of Unabarakai Association of Tokyo, the Japanese Zero Fighter Pilot Association.
The former pilots were on Oahu last week as guests to speak at the Pacific Aviation Museum’s 68th anniversary commemoration of the Battle of Midway.
“I was surprised to learn Harada and Iida had served together earlier in another unit, the Saeki Kokutai,” said Daniel King, a volunteer Japanese translator and historian. “They were in the same unit for three years, and he knew him quite well.”
Harada is credited with nine solo kills during World War II, but during the Dec. 7, 1941 attacks on Oahu, Harada was flying combat patrol to guard the Japanese fleet and bombers.
Iida was part of the invading Japanese fighter group during the Dec. 7, 1941 attacks on then Naval Air Station Kaneohe Bay and Naval Station Pearl Harbor. Harada noted attackers flew in teams of three, and neither of the pilots in Iida’s squadron survived. Japanese Imperial Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Shunichi Atsumi, who was Iida’s wingman, was shot down in aerial combat. The third pilot, Saburo Ishii, never returned.
Some of the Japanese Navy pilots who did survive were trained to fly but never able to takeoff because there were not enough aircraft to go around, said Shiro Wakita, an association member. Wakita said he entered the Naval Flying Corps in December 1943 and was excited to be a part of the Battle of Midway commemoration events on Oahu. The June 3 trip was his first time visiting Iida’s memorial at Kaneohe Bay.
“He’s our pilot,” he said. “It was very good to have his memorial here and for us to be allowed to visit, honoring his memory.”
Of the artifacts surviving from pilot’s crash site, a helmet believed to be Iida’s was returned to his relatives at a ceremony at MCB Hawaii in 1999. Both Wakita and Harada said they were touched to see the respect American officials showed to the remains of an enemy fighter by building a memorial.
“I greatly appreciate the Americans who built the memorial and how being a former enemy, I can still pay respects here,” Harada said. “I greatly appreciate what the Americans have done for us.”
He was also impressed at visiting memorials to other crashed pilots, including one at the Battleship Missouri Memorial. But seeing Iida’s memorial reminded Harada not just how good an aviator Iida was, but how intelligent and intuitive he was as a leader.
“I wished that man would have survived and helped Japan post-war,” Harada said. “As a human being, he was a wonderful person. It was really a loss. He could have been a leader of post-war Japan and made Japan a better place.”