The Final Storm - Jeff Shaara [41]
Yahara looked down, ignored the teacup.
“I must admit, sir, that I do not believe we can defeat them.”
It was a rare show of honesty, but Ushijima knew that he had Yahara’s trust, and had tried to use the man as a confidant as much as any commanding officer could.
“Why? General Cho believes we will drown them in their own blood. General Cho is very good at quoting history. The Japanese people have not suffered a military defeat in twenty-three hundred years. Did you know that? Well, certainly you do. You had to teach that to your own students at the military academy. I certainly did. They wrote down every word I said with delightful enthusiasm. Some of those boys are right out here, in this mountain. I have no doubt that every man in this army has faith in our future, in our inevitable victory. Isn’t that how General Cho puts it?”
“I am sorry I spoke, sir.”
“Never mind. I am not mocking you, Colonel. I speak only what we are to believe. Tokyo has never accepted that we can be defeated, and General Cho supports that philosophy. He certainly believes that the louder he shouts about it, the more genuine it becomes. Perhaps if we scream out our dreams, they become real.” He paused, sipped the tea. “You don’t agree.”
“Sir, the reports from Tokyo continue to insist that the Imperial Navy is on its way here, to relieve us, to destroy the American fleet. If shouting that will make it true, then I will shout it until my voice is gone. I have seen nothing of our fleet, or of the great flights of bombers that were promised us. Every morning I go to the mouths of the caves and I wait for the enemy to begin his assault. The enemy has their own plan, and once they begin their landings it will be too late.”
“Not according to Tokyo. It matters little what the Americans are doing on our soil. Once their fleet has been blasted to smoking wreckage, the Americans will have to admit defeat. Yes, I’ve heard everything you’ve heard. I recall hearing much the same after our attack on Pearl Harbor. Didn’t you? I recall hearing the reports of our great victories in the skies over Midway, our navy’s great triumph at Leyte Gulf, and only last week I received word that General MacArthur has had his army butchered in the streets of Manila. I have asked myself the question: How is it that we have struck such triumphant blows at the Americans and yet they manage to anchor a thousand warships off my beaches?”
Yahara blinked at him, and Ushijima knew the man would not say the words.
“Is it possible, Colonel, that we are not being told that this war has been lost?”
Yahara lowered his head, said in a low voice, “I have refused to believe that, sir. I … cannot believe it. But I felt a great despair when we had to abandon the islands, when the Americans took our bases in the Marianas. I have thought that once they broke through our inner ring, we could not drive them away. Is that what you believe as well?”
“No. We lost this war when we attacked Pearl Harbor. If we had kept our focus on Southeast Asia, if we had invaded Australia, if we had penned the English up in India, this war would be over. Nothing could have prevented us from establishing our new boundaries over lands that would become our new empire. But it was decided by those far more wise than I am, that instead of consolidating our strength in those places we could control, we should creep up upon the world’s greatest monster, and chop off his tail. And now, right out there, we are facing the monster’s wrath. Were you not told that the attack at Pearl Harbor destroyed America’s ability to fight at sea?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then who might those ships belong to out there? Did the great monster cower away, only to produce a twin whose tail is quite intact?”
Yahara continued to look down, and Ushijima knew what the man was feeling.
“Colonel, you took the same path in your younger years that I did. You chose to teach young soldiers the art of war. Teaching is a noble profession. Educated