Fading Victory: The Diary of Admiral Matome Ugaki, 1941-1945

Never before available in English, the diary of Admiral Ugaki is a candid and personal account of World War II by a major Japanese military leader. Revealing of the Japanese military mind and analytical about Japan's conduct of the war, Ugaki's diary begins in October 1941 and includes detailed entries covering virtually every day of the war in the Pacific. A career naval officer, Ugaki was appointed chief of staff of the Combined Fleet on 10 August 1941. On 19 February 1945, Ugaki was entrusted with command of the Fifth Air Fleet on Kyushu. The diary gives the reader intimate glimpses of the Imperial Navy at war and of the mind-set of a ranking Japanese admiral. We follow Ugaki to a staff conference of the Combined Fleet and stand beside him aboard the flagship Yamato when he describes the sinking of her sister ship Musashi in the battle of Leyte Gulf. We overhear him plan the last-ditch kamikaze attacks against U.S. forces on Okinawa from a bunker on Kyushu. Not only is the diary full of strategy, tactics, combat operations, and domestic politics, it also contains critcal and historically valuable postmortems of Japan's conduct of the war and is suggestive about the role of Emperor Hirohito. Its appraisals of the Americans - their methods, decisions, weaknesses, and strengths - are revealing and intelligent. From February 1945, as commander, Fifth Air Fleet, Ugaki lived through the terrible days of the B-29 raids, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, and the atom bomb. The loss of the war was the end of his world. On 15 August 1945, he decided on a suicide mission against US forces on Okinawa. Taking with him only his binoculars and the small sword Yamamoto had given him, Ugaki boarded the dive bomber Comet for his final flight.