Mutts Hirose

"MIS Occupational Experiences in Japan"

After spending four years behind barbed wired fences as a possible disloyal enemy of the United States of America, I came wobbling out of "camp" only to be drafted by Uncle Sam six months later. I didn't want to be a foot soldier, so I volunteered for the Air Force when it was opened to the Japanese Americans. I presumed that the Air Force and the Navy had not permitted us Japanese Americans into their outifts earlier due to the thought that just one of us could damage or sink an entire ship.

I went through basic training and remote control school when I was given a basic Japanese language test that sent me to M.I.S. L. S. at Presidio of Monterey in California. After intensive studies in Japanese language, geography, culture, and other courses related to Japan for nine months, I was loaded onto a troop ship named El Tinge. It was a very slow ship to Japan, twenty-four days in all. The kids from Hawaii looked forelongingly, sometimes with tears of sadness when we passed close enough to the Hawaiian Islands where we could see the shining lights of the islands above the black horizon.

The majority of the kids had gotten permission to take heavy Japanese dictionaries or texts to study on the ship. As I was not a very ambitious soldier, however, I stuffed my duffle bag with cartons of cigarettes, bars of soap, and boxes of candies to give to my "relatives" in Japan.

One incident on the troop ship of which I am proud even to this day was a time when all the bullying of my older brother paid off. During rainy days when we were forced to be cooped up on our adobe dirt ranch, my much older brother would force me to play chess with him. On the ship there was a physicist who had beaten all the other Niseis at chess. He had spied me reading a novel and asked me to play chess with him. I declined several times, but was finally forced to play just one game with him. Luckily I recalled the five or seven move checkmate my older brother had shown me and the soldier unknowingly fell into my trap. After his first loss, he waited for me at the top of the stairs every morning to challenge me again. A martial arts teacher had told me once if you beat a superior, don't ever give him another chance.

When we got to Manila Harbor, the harbor was filled with masts of sunken boats jutting out of the water. When we docked, the wharf was lined with the Philippine Nationals. They all yelled, "Hi Joe! Hi Joe!" Then when they spotted a Nisei soldier, they suddenly gasped in shock, "Hapon" (Japanese) and pointed to the Japanese American.

We were taken to Zama as soon as we docked in Japan to be processed. An interesting realization was that Niseis are a mixture of different Japanese prefectures and dialects. An example was when we were in a PX cafeteria and one of the Niseis trying to make time with a cute waitress said, "Shigoto erai daro?" The girl replied, "Eraku wa noi desuga tsukaremasu yo."

We were all transferred to Tokyo NYK building for more processing and Japanese language ability tests. I passed the tests, so was temporarily assigned to a task of filing papers at the Interrogation Sections. Most of the other kids lacked Japanese linguistics ability, so they were detained for more schooling.

After their brief schooling, Niseis were assigned to other outfits, CIC, military governments, etc. The so-called elite linguists were kept at N.Y.K. building as translators or interrogators. I was assigned to the Central Interrogation Section.

Soldiers were sent to places like Hirosaki and other ports where Japanese Nationals were repatriated (Hikiagesia) from China, Korea, and Russia. Soldiers assigned to the ports did first phase interrogation and the repatriots who were thought to have more valuable information were sent to NYK building for more intensive secondary interrogation.

The interrogation materials were all stamped "Top Secret". To give an example of the seriousness of our work, I recall an interrogator being court martialed and transferred to Guam for misplacing his interrogating guide. Another time, a Russian-American named Pavlov was also transferred to Guam. He paled around with the Russian Occupational soldiers and got into a drunken brawl with one of the Russian soldiers.

Assignment at the Interrogation Section was not difficult for me because I was given special privileges since I played softball and football for the GHQ team.

There was one short stubby lieutenant who was a group leader who had graduated from the University of Hawaii. He must have resented the fact that I was a kotonk given special privileges. My high school education was mainly in the War Relocation Center. We really didn't have credentialed teachers to give us a proper education. The short stubby lieutenant took every opportunity to correct my English grammar. And again, he could have been conscious of the Hawaii Niseis using Hawaiian pidgin English.

I was envious of the Niseis who were not too proficient in Japanese. They were sent back from their outfits periodically for refresher Japanese courses, while I was stuck at GHQ Tokyo where our rank advancements were frozen due to higher ranking soldiers re-enlisting and returning to Tokyo. Whereas soldiers in the outer areas were being promoted although they were not qualified nearly as much as we in Tokyo.

We all had to pull guard duty at N.Y.K. I was young and did not have the taste for female companionship yet. Therefore, I was asked by other soldiers to check them in for bed checks although they were absent visiting their girlfriends. They didn't fool anybody, but they stuffed their beds with bedding to look like they were sleeping while they were off somewhere with their "Yami" hand bags. Once when a rather unattractive lady asked me, "Do you want to see my I.D. again?" I made the mistake of saying, "Once is enough!"

Seems like every soldier that was assigned billets facing the Kaijo building had a pair of binoculars. Kaijo was a female civil service building where the girls were billeted. When we made bed checks at night, we would often observe soldiers peering through their binoculars toward Kaijo building. It was obvious which soldiers had been looking at the ladies. They had circular lens ring evidence around their eyes. At times we would see the Japanese maids looking at us with binoculars.

Of course, there were a few female exhibitionists. But at times, our unit would get phone calls from the females telling the company clerk about which floor, how many windows from a certain corner, etc. At our weekly orientation, Top Sergeant Ryan once cautioned us, "If you want to be a peeping Tom, at least turn the lights off and you can watch just as well from way in from the windows!"

There were many pan-pan or pansukes walking the streets. Rumor was that the reason they were called pan-pan girls was that they were able to buy bread for every trick that they turned.

We had several "legitimate girls" who did not have dates waiting at the NYK entrance to be asked to go up to our top floor on dance nights once a week. They knew I didn't attend the dances because if you did, you would have to pull guard duties for the dance.

One time, my roommate asked me to do him a favor since he had two girls. I reluctantly accepted. He brought the two girls up to our floor where I got in the elevator with the guy and the two girls. The girl that was my date told me at the mess hall (dance room) that she was really supposed to be my buddy's date, but he switched girls in the elevator.

The F.E.A.F. G.I.'s billeted a few buildings away were jealous of the bi-lingualed Niseis, so they would wait at the Morunouchi building late at night to jump the Niseis coming from Tokyo Station. Several Niseis were severely beaten.

Hearsay: A Japanese girl was walking along the street when a couple of Caucasian soldiers followed her from behind shouting, "Nice ass - hubba, hubba o-jo-san! anata utsukushii moshi moshi. Ano-ne-ano-ne! Give me shakuhachi!" At which time the girl turned around and said in fluent English, "Why don't you two ass-holes go jump in the Emperor's mote!" She was a Nisei DAC!

There were two cases that I'm aware of about two Nisei soldiers impregnating their Japanese girl friends. One came sobbing into our room telling us that he was distressed and didn't know what to do because his girl was pregnant. The other soldier had a nervous breakdown. He went into the guardhouse and took a 45 pistol to commit suicide. Luckily, he couldn't find any ammunition. If I'm not mistaken, there was no ammunition because we always armed ourselves during guard duty, but never were given bullets.

I really felt sorry for the Furojis - the abandoned orphans living in the chi-ka tetsu (subway).

There were two ladies selling bento at the entrance of the N.Y.K. building. One was dressed in the wartime Japanese outfit and the other was always dressed in kimono. We were not supposed to eat Japanese food because of the wormy, fecal fertilizer they used. But, being Niseis, we craved Japanese food and as a result, many became very ill.

The only period I suffered was when they loaned me out to the Navy supposedly for two weeks. I suffered due to Tokyo forgetting about me for three months. Little money that I had was depleted before the first month was up. Being a young kid, I did not know where to get a temporary loan if there was any. I finally called Tokyo to send down my replacement. I guess there wasn't anyone who wanted to come down to Sesebo.

I guess I could say that I was on the destroyer that President Kennedy's son was buried. They had a fleet of three destroyers sailing along the Korean Straits guarding against black marketeers and smugglers. Every time they stopped a suspicious ship, they sent me up alone first on the rope ladder. If everything was clear for boarding, I would signal the naval officers to come aboard. The first time I learned about the seasick pill being used now was when an Australian officer on the destroyer, Warramonger, introduced me to dramamine. Besides this, I believe the only time that I was useful to the Australian shipmates was when they asked me to wait underneath the bow. Suddenly two large laundry bags were thrown off the bow. When I caught the heavy bags, they were filled with Australian G.I. soap, etc. that the two sailors would barter on shore. All I received was sore ribs.

ATIS (Allied Translator and Interrogation Section) had a tryout for their softball team which consisted mainly of soldiers from Hawaii, P.X., and supplies personnel. Although I was a "Kotonk" I made the team because they need a "pi-cha"!

ATIS won the GHQ League Championship and the Far Eastern Tournament. There was a unique player playing on the ESS team. He was Major General Marquet. I was cocky and a respectable kid. Therefore, whenever the General came up to bat, I pitched the ball right in the groove batting practice style.

Another occurrence I vividly remember is when we played Tokyo Repo Depot. They had an outstanding black pitcher named Alex Litman who was also an outstanding football player and sprinter. On one occasion when Alex Litman came to bat, my Caucasian catcher named Fowler from Texas pounded his mitt and yelled, "Strike this Nigger out!" Alex Litman was about 6'4" tall. Litman cocked his bat and chased my catcher all the way out to left field!

Beginning the second softball season Angel Kageyama, the team captain stopped me in the hall and said, "Hey, Lefty, if you no re-up, I'm going to bust you up!"

I replied, "Even if you beat me up, I'm not going to re-enlist because I promised my mother that I would go to college after I get discharged."

Maybe I lucked out. Most of the MIS soldiers were sent to Korea when the Korean War broke out. In fact, one of the kids I ran around with in concentration camp was captured and spread-eagled in Korea.

I also played football for GHQ so they gave me half-a-day interrogation so that I could go to practice in the afternoons.

The only regret I still have was when they announced ahead of time that Mrs. MacArthur was going to be present to shake each of our hands. I was young and probably didn't care, but I could very easily have asked the Stars and Stripes photographer to snap my picture when Mrs. MacArthur shook my hand at the fifty yard line.

There were many Japanese piple who came to see me. These Japanese came to my dad's farm for free meals when they were going to the University of Southern California. Among them were three prime ministers after World War II. They were Miki, Nikaido, and Kishi. (I have photos of these people taken in our community).

By the way, other soldiers not in the MIS or GHQ used to call us GHQ "Geisha House Queers".

At times, I reminisce the period I used to copy speaking Hawaiian pidgin English, but immediately am reminded by my ex-wife who is from Hawaii, "I speak better English than you - I went to Punahou."

I was able to take a furlough to my parents' kokyo. Like to Yamanashi-ken and Sapporo. My mother's favorite park, Nakajima Koen and my uncle having to come looking for me because I spent more time with my MIS buddies than my relatives. One of the soldiers I was happy to meet was Bud Mukai, the sumo Yokozuna of California, who used to tag along to haul our farm produce.

My uncle from Asahigawa, Hokkaido wanted to take me to Jozonkei hot springs. It was off-limits so I refused although I could have very easily gone there wearing civilian clothes.

Another incident I regret and am ashamed of even to this day is: We got on the train from Kusakabe, Yamanashi to Kofu, the capitol of Yamanashi Prefecture.

My uncle and aunt were able to board the white striped occupational and second class car because I was a U.S.A. soldier. Suddenly, the train stopped on the way to Kofu, and the conductor ordered all the Japanese Nationals to get off the second class car and get on the other car packed with Japanese Nationals. We were the only three left on the white striped car.

I was young, naive, and really did not know what was happening. I often think of that incident and keep asking myself, why didn't I tell the conductor not to order the others to get off the white striped car.

My greatest concern while I was with the occupational force was the orphaned Furojis living in the chika tetsus. I often wonder what became of them? Did they become yakuzas, prostitutes, or were some able to make something of themselves? I could not fault the pan-pan girls either.

Other than these shortcomings, it was a great experience for me. I was fortunate to meet and pal around with Niseis from other areas, especially the Hawaiian bunch. Like a kid named Seta who always shouted "no mo luck man!" and threw dollar bills out of the window when his poker hands were sour. Thank you, Seta, I was always under the window.

Although it was during the period of unrest, I had an opportunity to get an inkling of my parents' background. I would certainly like to retrace my stay in Japan, although I'm certain I will not recognize the Japan of today compared to the burned out Japan of my occupational days.