Chapter 638: A Different Kind of Work
On the boundless sea, the calm was refreshing, a scene of peace. This was one of the world’s most beautiful vacation destinations, and also one of its most important battlefields. The Hawaiian Islands, a place that haunted the dreams of both America and Japan.
Several Japanese officers stood on the beach, staring intently at the sea in the distance. They had been trapped here for 20 days. Although the Americans had only retaken the parts of Oahu that hadn’t been fully occupied, for the 29,000 soldiers of the Great Japanese Empire on the island of Kauai, it was an agony of the cruelest kind.
The Japanese soldiers had done their best to fortify their positions. When the Combined Fleet withdrew, it had scraped together all the ammunition it could find and left it for these imperial soldiers who were in desperate need of supplies. However, a dozen days later, the Japanese soldiers discovered that what they needed most was not ammunition and cover, but fresh water and food.
The Americans had fought a bloody battle for Kauai, destroying the island’s desalination system. What was worse, the island’s food reserves were not large to begin with, and with the American army’s deliberate destruction and removal of supplies, there was not much food for the Japanese soldiers to find. Now, their ammunition was almost untouched, but their stomachs were completely empty.
“Baka! To think that the valiant army of our Great Japanese Empire would be defeated by hunger like this! Those despicable Americans, why don’t they just counter-attack and land, and fight us to the death?” a general complained in a hoarse voice, his hand on his sword. His lips were frighteningly chapped, as if he hadn’t had a drink of water for a long time.
The man speaking was the commander of the main Japanese force, Lieutenant General Oshima, commanding officer of the 4th Division. The general next to him was the deputy commander of the Japanese forces on the island and concurrent chief of staff, Lieutenant General Fukuda of the 131st Division. At this moment, both of their divisions still retained about half of their combat effectiveness. As for the pitiful two Japanese marine divisions, most of them had already been wiped out on Oahu.
But now, the two of them rather envied the two marine divisions who could die a glorious death in battle on Oahu. Dying on the battlefield was clearly a more satisfying end than starving to death in a foxhole.
“Didn’t the telegram from Imperial General Headquarters tell us to prepare small boats and soldiers who can swim, and to wait here for supplies?” Lieutenant General Fukuda, sporting Japan’s most classic Hitler-style mustache, said with a frown, somewhat dissatisfied.
They had already been waiting here for nearly five hours. Not far behind them, two assault boats were hidden under camouflage netting. In the trenches further away, 200 Japanese soldiers who were excellent swimmers waited. Although they were all pale from hunger, they still exuded the heavy, murderous aura of executioners.
“Hey! Hey! Look over there!” a Japanese soldier perched in a tree shouted, pointing at the distant sea and drawing everyone’s attention. On the far horizon, a conning tower was slowly rising. A grey railing emerged from the water, seawater still dripping from it. The white hull number, heavily corroded, was faintly visible.
“It’s a navy submarine! The Empire has not abandoned us! We can continue to fight!” Seeing the submarine, Lieutenant General Fukuda almost burst into tears. If he had a choice, he wouldn’t want to die on this American island either. But according to the tradition of Japanese soldiers committing suicide when they cannot win, his death had seemed a foregone conclusion.
Now, the arrival of supplies had clearly rekindled his hope of survival. At least with these supplies, his troops could hold on for a few more days. With these few days, they could look forward to the next supply run. The feeling of seeing hope in the midst of despair was truly wonderful.
“Quick! Get the men into the sea to meet them! American planes often patrol nearby, we have to hurry and bring back the supplies the submarine has brought!” Lieutenant General Oshima of the 4th Division was clearly more composed. As the overall commander of the Japanese forces, he always maintained a standard poker face, but the hand resting on his sword was trembling slightly.
So many soldiers had died in vain from disease and lack of water in their positions. The enemy had eliminated thousands of elite soldiers of the Great Japanese Empire without firing a single shot. Japan had spared no effort in training these soldiers. Many were veterans with over three years of service, their combat skills were world-class, their marksmanship was accurate, and they fought with great courage. Yet such soldiers were starving and dying of thirst in their positions.
In the end, the desperate Japanese soldiers had resorted to any means necessary to find food. They would place any small objects they could find on the beach, and after the tide went out, things like steel helmets with bullet holes would be filled with small crabs and other creatures. The Japanese soldiers relied on this food to fill their stomachs.
The poor food and unclean drinking water led to outbreaks of disease among the Japanese soldiers, making the situation for the garrison on Kauai, which was short on medicine and doctors, even more difficult. Now that supplies had finally arrived, the situation could be alleviated. For the Japanese soldiers on the island, this was absolutely super-inspiring news.
“Banzai!” Who knew if it was “long live the Emperor,” or “long live Imperial General Headquarters,” or “long live all the people who started the war.” In any case, someone shouted “Banzai,” and everyone else shouted it along with them. As for who could truly live for ten thousand years, only a being on the level of God would know.
“Quick! Quick!” With a speed and spirit they usually reserved for a charge, a group of Japanese soldiers, naked except for their loincloths, rushed into the azure sea. Behind them, other Japanese soldiers carried assault boats and frantically headed for the coast, as if they could pilot them all the way back to Japan from there.
In the face of hunger and despair, people forget their more distant, extravagant hopes. When the war began, everyone prayed they could win. Later, they hoped they could go home or get some rest. But on the island of Kauai, the Japanese soldiers only hoped for a bottle of plain water and a rice ball.
On the distant sea, the Japanese submarine had fully surfaced. The sailors were carrying out waterproof-wrapped supplies from the hatches and placing them on the deck. Some less valuable supplies that could float were ruthlessly thrown into the sea.
The Japanese soldiers swam to the submarine and began swimming back with the supplies. They clearly did not have much strength left, so their speed was not fast. The variety of supplies was overwhelming: there was gasoline and diesel for fuel, ammunition which they did not lack, and various other supplementary equipment. Of course, there was also some urgently needed medicine and food.
Because this Japanese submarine had set sail with a full load of supplies when the Japanese were still fighting the Americans on Oahu, and the food and water shortage had not yet emerged, the amount of the most urgently needed supply, food, was not very large.
The submarine crew even took out some of their own food reserves, but it was still not enough to give the friendly troops on land a full meal. After all, the rations for a few dozen submarine crew members were just a drop in the bucket compared to the nearly thirty thousand mouths that needed to be fed.
When the soldiers, who had exhausted their strength to get ashore, opened the packages and saw the ammunition wrapped in oil paper inside, their hopeful hearts immediately plunged into an icy abyss. They collapsed on the beach, motionless no matter how much others shouted at them. The few bags of food were snatched up the moment they reached the shore.
“How did the war turn out like this?” the Japanese commander, Lieutenant General Oshima, sighed and shook his head upon seeing the chaotic scene. Fortunately, some Japanese soldiers retained a final shred of reason and delivered a few bags of food to his feet. Otherwise, this Japanese commander might have become the first high-ranking Japanese general to commit seppuku due to hunger.
And in the distant Japanese submarine, the captain, looking through his periscope at his comrades on the beach, let out a similar sigh: “How did the war turn out like this?”
He had studied for a long time in the submarine training school and had mastered a great deal of knowledge about submarine command. But after the war between Japan and the United States broke out, he could only act as a tag-along, trailing behind the Japanese Combined Fleet and carrying out strange tasks like reconnaissance.
As for ambushing the enemy’s transport lines and sinking tens of thousands of tons of enemy ships like their German counterparts, that was a good thing he didn’t even dare to dream of. A few days ago, when a Japanese battleship was sunk by an unknown submarine, all the Japanese submarine commanders, while wringing their hands in grief, also hoped in their hearts that they could achieve such a glorious result.
But no Japanese submarine commander had ever been promoted to the high command. The bigwigs in the Navy Ministry at Imperial General Headquarters, who had all come from battleship command, even looked down on “unconventional” officers like the aircraft carrier commander Nagumo Chuichi, let alone these “illegitimate” submarine commanders.
Not everyone had Akado’s absolutely correct strategic vision from a future era, and not every country’s navy was without its own traditions. The total annihilation of the German Navy in the First World War was not without its benefits. At least in terms of establishing a new officer corps and eliminating the traditional rifts between commanders, it had been of great benefit.
After the German submarine force had already proven its superb value through its actions, the world’s naval powers did not immediately break free from their traditional shackles but responded slowly and inefficiently under the force of inertia. At least here in the naval power of Japan, they had not learned the essence of the powerful and battle-hardened German submarine force.
And so, the Japanese long-range submarine force, which should have been extremely powerful, was now only being used as a super transport fleet. “Why are the same branches of the military doing such different kinds of work?” this Japanese submarine commander thought helplessly.
Published: 2025-09-13T02:48:31.000+00:00
Last Edited: 2026-02-02T20:27:54.000+00:00
URL: https://www.patreon.com/caleredhair/posts/mtr-c638-kind-of-138783221
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