Japanese Americans in World War II Intelligence
Central Intelligence Agency
News and Information (2012)
Asian Pacific American Heritage month is
an appropriate occasion to highlight the contributions of a small band of
Japanese Americans who served in the Office of Special Services (OSS), the
CIA’s precursor, during World War II. These soldiers were among a small number
of Japanese Americans to serve in Asia during that period. They provided
essential language and cultural skills to OSS while facing enemies with whom
they shared physical resemblances and sometimes, even family ties.
The Beginnings
Japanese-Americans enlisted in the US
Army during World War II even though the US government forced many of their
families into internment camps in the wake of Imperial Japan’s attack on Pearl
Harbor. In late 1943, an OSS representative visited the military’s
Japanese American combat unit, the 442nd Infantry Regiment, at Camp
Shelby in Mississippi. The representative asked for volunteers who could read
and write Japanese and were willing to undertake extremely hazardous
assignments. More than 100 men volunteered, but only 14 were ultimately
selected for OSS missions. All were Nisei, the US-born children of
Japanese immigrants.
The volunteers underwent rigorous training
for operations behind enemy lines. For most of 1944, they studied Japanese
language and geography, survival skills, hand-to-hand combat, explosives, and
radio operation. They were assigned to OSS Detachments 101 and 202, special
operations units that operated in the China-Burma-India Theater. Once deployed,
they were to interrogate prisoners, translate documents, monitor radio
communications, and conduct covert operations. They left the US in November
1944.
Deployment
The military abandoned initial plans to
send the Nisei to Japan when it was deemed too dangerous to put the
linguists at risk of capture on enemy soil. Five Nisei, Chiyoki Ikeda,
Takao Tanabe, Susumu Kazahaya, George Kobayashi, and Tad Nagaki were sent to
China. Dick Betsui and Wilbert Kishinami went to India. Calvin Tottori, Tom
Baba, Fumio Kido, Shoichi Kurahashi, Ralph Yempuku, Junichi Buto, and Dick
Hamada were sent to Burma. In an oral history, Hamada said, “Knowing that we
were not going to Japan was a great relief. Thus, when we were shipped to
Burma, I felt, or even our group felt, we could do more to aid the Americans,
fight the enemy.”
In Burma, Detachment 101 operated behind
Japanese lines with native ethnic Kachin soldiers to drive
out Japanese forces.
This posed particular risks for the Japanese American soldiers. Hamada said,
“Being in a jungle, being that we possess the face of an enemy, I was very much
afraid of people that I didn’t know. I was safe with my people, Americans. . .
But there are other people that you would run with during your campaign that
didn’t know who you were. And that was what I was afraid of. I was afraid of
being shot by them. So an American always [accompanied] me wherever I went.
That’s for safety.”
The Nisei were warned that
Japanese forces would be ruthless with them as prisoners of war. Hamada
recounted, “I was instructed to keep one bullet for myself in the event I
should get captured. . . Because the ultimate torture would be so great and I’d
probably end up dead after all that investigation torture.” According to Hamada
and Yempuku, the Japanese offered a $20,000 reward to anyone who captured a Nisei
in Burma.
Clandestine Operations
Detachment 101 and 102’s clandestine
operations were extremely successful. Their accomplishments in Burma
included rescuing downed American pilots, attacking Japanese-held villages,
cutting off enemy supply routes, and collecting valuable intelligence. In
1945, they participated in a series of mercy missions to rescue prisoners of
war in China, Manchuria and Korea.
Toward the end of the war, Yempuku had
an experience that highlighted the difficulties that many Japanese Americans
faced during WWII; he crossed paths with a brother in the Japanese army.
Yempuku was watching the ceremony marking Japan’s surrender to the British in
Hong Kong. Unbeknownst to him, his brother was the interpreter for the
Japanese official in the ceremony. Yempuku did not see his brother that day but
learned of his role later from a friend who had been translating for the
British. Three of Yempuku’s brothers had been drafted into the Japanese army
and become prisoners of war.
A number of the OSS Nisei
received awards for their exceptional service. Their accomplishments
have
become part of the Japanese American legacy and intelligence history. For
more information about Japanese Americans in WWII intelligence, see the Studies
in Intelligence article, “FBIS Against the
Axis, 1941-1945,”
by Stephen C. Mercado.
Editor's note: Quotes in this article
came from the Hawai`i
Nisei Story
and from the Japanese
American Veterans Association [external link
disclaimer].
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