Two Japanese Soldiers Found Still Unaware Of WW2's End

[K.W.S]

This really is a crazy story i heard
(sorry if its a repost)

my grandad told me that yesterday 2 japanese men aged 80 were found in the pacific still unaware of ww2s end!

Earlier reports said the two men on Mindanao may have been part of the "Panther Division", a Japanese unit cut off as US forces re-occupied the Philippines in 1945.

more info here>
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4585287.stm and
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4592995.stm

is there any pictures of these men anywhere? i heard they still had there rifles with them and uniforms!

[Midav]

wonder what they've been doing all that time..?

[Dalleer]

Well , just think about the freakin' culture shock they're going to have when they return home.

[ShotOver]

Imperial Friggin Royal Jap Marines.

[K.W.S]

its rumoured they was just living off the land in the hills

[Violet Fashion by Mindy]

Well , just think about the freakin' culture shock they're going to have when they return home.

They will probably go back and wonder how the **** Japan lost the war considering how hi tech and prosperous Japan has become.

[K.W.S]

it says on the bbc site they have gone back into the jungle :cantbeli:

[mudbunny]

I spent significant time in Okinawa, and trust me dude, it's not that farfetched. I was there around '96, and they pulled an old Jap. soldier out of a cave on Okinawa, and he had been there since the battle of Okinawa in 1943 (I think). It certainly lends credence to the notion that all Japanese military and civilians were totally brainwashed by the Emperor and his flunkies. It lends even greater credence to the fact that if the U.S would have invaded mainland Japan, it would have been, quite possibly, the biggest bloodbath in human and military history.

[b33f]

wonder what they've been doing all that time..?

Starring in one Bud Spencer/Terence Hill flick, forgot the title.

[Aerosoul]

Apparently there are even more in those hills, and they fear a court martial if they return.

[CountZero]

Apparently there are even more in those hills, and they fear a court martial if they return.

yup quite a tricky proposition legal position

[spyguy]

I saw a special on the history channel about a solider they pulled from the jungle on some Philippine island or something, and he was still waging war against the locals by stealing their food and on occasion sniping them concealed positions. His family came with search parties over like 4 or 5 times during the time he was there to search for him but every time he thought they were like working for the americans or trying to reveal him so that he could be captured. He remembered his last orders were to never surrender. He finally came out i'm not sure why less than ten years ago and was not charged for the hell he put the Philippine town through for the last 55 years

[Trident-za]

Goddamn... how much mental strength is required to still try to "be" a soldier 60 years after your war has ended? I mean, seriously... how many of you could hide in a cave/jungle for 60 years, with no info from your superiors, just waiting for the 'war' to arrive at your doorstep?

[Ichhabe]

Goddamn... how much mental strength is required to still try to "be" a soldier 60 years after your war has ended? I mean, seriously... how many of you could hide in a cave/jungle for 60 years, with no info from your superiors, just waiting for the 'war' to arrive at your doorstep?

Dedication, total dedication.

[gaz]

how many of you could hide in a cave/jungle for 60 years,

We've got members here who are going to have their heads stuck up their own arses for the rest of their lives, I know it's not exactly the same but it's the best comparison I can think of.

[Aerosoul]

Goddamn... how much mental strength is required to still try to "be" a soldier 60 years after your war has ended? I mean, seriously... how many of you could hide in a cave/jungle for 60 years, with no info from your superiors, just waiting for the 'war' to arrive at your doorstep?

That's the thing...they're isolated for so long, they lose touch with reality. It's the lack of sanity that seems to keep them going. But I may have it backwards, I don't know. I just can't imagine what it would be like.

I'm dumbfounded by theses tories.

[Trident-za]

how many of you could hide in a cave/jungle for 60 years,

We've got members here who are going to have their heads stuck up their own arses for the rest of their lives, I know it's not exactly the same but it's the best comparison I can think of.

rofl

Fair point, Gaz :)

[CountZero]

Goddamn... how much mental strength is required to still try to "be" a soldier 60 years after your war has ended? I mean, seriously... how many of you could hide in a cave/jungle for 60 years, with no info from your superiors, just waiting for the 'war' to arrive at your doorstep?

That's the thing...they're isolated for so long, they lose touch with reality. It's the lack of sanity that seems to keep them going. But I may have it backwards, I don't know. I just can't imagine what it would be like.

I'm dumbfounded by theses tories.

also from what i understood in most millitary today if a unit loses communication with its superiors it is supposed to continue by the last order given to it

but this shows immense loyalty and dedication

[Yosy]

Goddamn... how much mental strength is required to still try to "be" a soldier 60 years after your war has ended? I mean, seriously... how many of you could hide in a cave/jungle for 60 years, with no info from your superiors, just waiting for the 'war' to arrive at your doorstep?

Brainwashing. The longer you stay in such a situation, the hardest it is to get back into the real world.

[hughdotoh]

wonder what they've been doing all that time..?

Starring in one Bud Spencer/Terence Hill flick, forgot the title.

Who Finds a Friend Finds a Treasure

[BlackFlag]

Goddamn... how much mental strength is required to still try to "be" a soldier 60 years after your war has ended? I mean, seriously... how many of you could hide in a cave/jungle for 60 years, with no info from your superiors, just waiting for the 'war' to arrive at your doorstep?
Bushido.

yes bushido, the Samurai warrior code.

[Seiyuuki]

Eh...depend on how you look at it, he could have committed seppuku. Though being on the pragmatic side, to last sixty years, that take something a whole lot more than words written by samurai a long time ago when they had too much time on their hand.

[ronin2172]

Eh...depend on how you look at it, he could have committed seppuku. Though being on the pragmatic side, to last sixty years, that take something a whole lot more than words written by samurai a long time ago when they had too much time on their hand.
x2 according to bushido which states that to die for the emperor is the greatest thing one can do (which proves that this was written AFTER the demise of the samurai), these guys shoulda died in a glorious charge on a squad of US marines....or a gaggle of filipino fishermen...whichever is closest by...

[NicNZ]

Veterans elude Japanese
Japanese diplomats hoping for a meeting with two second world war veterans said to be living in a remote part of the southern Philippines were told to return to Manila as hope faded that the men even existed.
John Aglionby
www.guardian.co.uk

[bertfivesix]

I saw a special on the history channel about a solider they pulled from the jungle on some Philippine island or something, and he was still waging war against the locals by stealing their food and on occasion sniping them concealed positions. His family came with search parties over like 4 or 5 times during the time he was there to search for him but every time he thought they were like working for the americans or trying to reveal him so that he could be captured. He remembered his last orders were to never surrender. He finally came out i'm not sure why less than ten years ago and was not charged for the hell he put the Philippine town through for the last 55 years

http://www.wanpela.com/holdouts/profiles/onoda.html

[AROUETLJ]

I'm dumbfounded by theses tories.

That what Michael Howard said.

[Loco]

I spent significant time in Okinawa, and trust me dude, it's not that farfetched. I was there around '96, and they pulled an old Jap. soldier out of a cave on Okinawa, and he had been there since the battle of Okinawa in 1943 (I think). It certainly lends credence to the notion that all Japanese military and civilians were totally brainwashed by the Emperor and his flunkies. It lends even greater credence to the fact that if the U.S would have invaded mainland Japan, it would have been, quite possibly, the biggest bloodbath in human and military history.
In a big, hard and massive conflict always there´s dispersed people or simply forgotten in a remote place, and fear together with loneliness isn´t good for your mental health. In Spain there was the case of the so called "topos"(the moles), refugees that when the civil war were persecuted or felt threatened of being executed and they hided behind a wall or in the small garret of their own home, being feeded and cared by their own families or friends through the years. At least a dozen of them spent more than 30 years hidden, without being under the sun light, and even appeared some "topo" in 1976, when the dictatorship finished in Spain, and he had been hidden 40 years.
There´s a beautiful japanese movie about some soldiers of Japan in the end of the war, "The Burmese Harp" of Kon Ichikawa.

[Yosy]

^^^^^yes the same happened in Saddam's Iraq.

[Paracaidista]

how many of you could hide in a cave/jungle for 60 years,

We've got members here who are going to have their heads stuck up their own arses for the rest of their lives, I know it's not exactly the same but it's the best comparison I can think of.

rofl rofl

[americanbychoice]

"to die for the emperor is the greatest thing one can do"

I believe in the Hagakure (written by Yamamoto Tsunemoto as the "glory" of the samurai era was ending) it doesn't say that any death is glorious or great.

Death simply is that inevitable end to life, and death in Service is about duty... not greatness. Giving anything less than death is not giving one's full measure of devotion as a retainer.

There is no shame in meeting the end (death) without achieving the goal, and that is at the heart of Bushido. It is more about how you do things rather than what you ultimately achieve that is the measure of your worth as a warrior-retainer.

Whether yes or no, the only choice is death (or some saying like that). It's very Zen that way. Step forward, do what is expected of you, no matter who or what opposes you. Bushido is about being what simply is expected of a warrior-retainer, and not about being great.

I agree that these men are not good examples of Bushido. Their choice seemed to be to cheat the end/death for as long as possible... which is NOT what a true retainer would do, if you believe in the idealized samurai system of Bushido.

So what might hold these men in the hills could be their understanding of Bushido... but not because they served well.

[ckabusk]

http://cache.*****images.com/comp/53000820.jpg?x=x&dasite=MS_GINS&ef=2&ev=1&dareq=46F9E1EC3E3E81DFA9D9DA2C0D3280FBA9C30E9B9B114CE8
http://cache.*****images.com/comp/53000821.jpg?x=x&dasite=MS_GINS&ef=2&ev=1&dareq=46F9E1EC3E3E81DF787268EC074645EEA9C30E9B9B114CE8

"Marlyn Berderol Nagaki holds a Japanese flag inscribed with the names of more than 30 supposed Japanese World War II soldiers at Cagayan De Oro 31 May 2005. Marlyn Berderol Nagaki, descendant of a Japanese World War II soldier who fought in the southern Philippines, said the flag was given to her by a man named "Sakurai" in the town of Cabanglasan in December 2002. Japanese embassy officials are investigating reports of two Japanese World War II holdouts hiding out among guerrillas on Mindanao island 60 years after the end of the war."

[Seiyuuki]

There´s a beautiful japanese movie about some soldiers of Japan in the end of the war, "The Burmese Harp" of Kon Ichikawa.

Maybe it's just me, but I found that movie somewhat melodramatic. :|

[Para]

The Japanese are now casting doubt's about all this.

[Seiyuuki]

"to die for the emperor is the greatest thing one can do"

I believe in the Hagakure (written by Yamamoto Tsunemoto as the "glory" of the samurai era was ending) it doesn't say that any death is glorious or great.

Death simply is that inevitable end to life, and death in Service is about duty... not greatness. Giving anything less than death is not giving one's full measure of devotion as a retainer.

There is no shame in meeting the end (death) without achieving the goal, and that is at the heart of Bushido. It is more about how you do things rather than what you ultimately achieve that is the measure of your worth as a warrior-retainer.

Whether yes or no, the only choice is death (or some saying like that). It's very Zen that way. Step forward, do what is expected of you, no matter who or what opposes you. Bushido is about being what simply is expected of a warrior-retainer, and not about being great.

I agree that these men are not good examples of Bushido. Their choice seemed to be to cheat the end/death for as long as possible... which is NOT what a true retainer would do, if you believe in the idealized samurai system of Bushido.

So what might hold these men in the hills could be their understanding of Bushido... but not because they served well.

Though the dilemma is that during the time of constant warfares, the samurai were more realistic. You do run away from a battle, live to fight for another day, you do stab someone in the back, better to kill him and worry about all this honor stuffs later, death is best when it can be avoided, etc. While there are certain code of honor every samurai abide to in all time period, the Hagakure and some of the code of Bushido as most know it today was formulated when there was relative peace and most samurai just sat around performing tea ceremoney and meditate. One of them just happen to start writing what a samurai should be in a perfert world, which is never the case. Bushido or not, I give credit to any man who manage to survive sixty years in some remote jungle, basically cut off from the rest of the world.

[RGRBOX]

Damn.... I feel sorry for these guys... good soldiers.. even if they were on the other side of the conflict...

[americanbychoice]

Right. Yamamoto Tsunemoto wrote the Hagakure in reaction to the excesses of the younger generation of samurai as their era was waning... he wanted to present/preserve the idealized form of Bushido as he perceived it being lost to the newer generation of warriors. To compare the Bushido in the Hagakure to real samurai would be like comparing King Arthur's knights to the actual mounted warrior "nobility" of Europe during the height of the Feudal period.

Seems like the Japanese during WW2 had more of the idealized form of Bushido (as twisted by the cult of the Emperor by the Japanese militarists) than the practical side of it, at least in terms of embracing Death as the ultimate form of Service.

As for the Japanese soldiers who may be in the jungles of the Philippines, I don't know if it's admirable or foolish for my country's enemies to hide in the jungle of an allied nation for 60 years or not. Probably a mix of both.

[Tally Man]

Which one won the immunity challenge?

[ronin2172]

Seems like the Japanese during WW2 had more of the idealized form of Bushido (as twisted by the cult of the Emperor by the Japanese militarists) than the practical side of it, at least in terms of embracing Death as the ultimate form of Service.
Exactly what I was getting at with my post when I said glorious...although I was attempting to be a bit silly!

Bushido has been through several forms and like Seiyuki said whether the samurai actually followed it or simply paid lip service to it is difficult to ascertain.

For most of the period of their dominance the samurai were beholden to their individual house codes.

Again like Seyuky said; it is interesting to note that it did not become the standard of conduct UNTIL after the establishment of the Tokugawa shogunate (a time of peace).

Later it became the basis of the cult of emperor worship after the meji restoration...when the emperor (after centuries) finally got his power back from the shoguns.

[Yosy]

Good posts about the Bushido everyone. But one must remember that the samurai were the social elite in feudal Japan. Their antithesis was the ninja. Ninjas had only one code: do everything in their power to get the job done. While for a samurai it wouldn't be honerable to stab someone in the back, the ninja wouldn't think twice about it, if it would help him. And the ninja were always from the lower social classes of Japan: their weapons are based in agricultural tools. And while the samurai put loyalty above everything else, the ninja were more pragmatic: they would work for anyone that wanted their services and were willing to pay.

[MaDuce]

Well , just think about the freakin' culture shock they're going to have when they return home.

They will probably go back and wonder how the f*** Japan lost the war considering how hi tech and prosperous Japan has become.

No they will be like ???????what happended to NES??????