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Japanese Destroyer Captain: Pearl Harbor, Guadalcanal, Midway - The Great Naval Battles as Seen Through Japanese Eyes Paperback – Illustrated, August 15, 2011

by Capt. Tameichi Hara (Author), Fred Saito Roger Pineau (Contributor)

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This highly regarded war memoir was a best seller in both Japan and the United States during the 1960s and has long been treasured by historians for its insights into the Japanese side of the surface war in the Pacific. The author was a survivor of more than one hundred sorties against the Allies and was known throughout Japan as the "Unsinkable Captain." A hero to his countrymen, Capt. Hara exemplified the best in Japanese surface commanders: highly skilled (he wrote the manual on torpedo warfare), hard driving, and aggressive. Moreover, he maintained a code of honor worthy of his samurai grandfather, and, as readers of this book have come to appreciate, he was as free with praise for American courage and resourcefulness as he was critical of himself and his senior commanders.

Print length

336 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Naval Institute Press
Publication date

August 15, 2011
Dimensions

6 x 0.9 x 9 inches
ISBN-10

1591143845
ISBN-13

978-1591143840
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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Capt. Tameichi Hara was a destroyer squadron commander for most of the war aboard Shigure.

Fred Saito translated and expanded the original manuscript, after spending more than eight hundred hours interviewing Hara.

Roger Pineau added the footnotes and checked the accuracy of the battle accounts.

Product details

Publisher : Naval Institute Press; Illustrated edition (August 15, 2011)
Language : English
Paperback : 336 pages
ISBN-10 : 1591143845
ISBN-13 : 978-1591143840
Item Weight : 1.18 pounds
Dimensions : 6 x 0.9 x 9 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #40,987 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #14 in Historical Japan Biographies
- #29 in Japanese Biographies
- #47 in United States Military Veterans History

Customer Reviews:
421 ratings

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Top reviews from the United States

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Invaluable first-hand account of Japanese naval actions throughout WWII.

Reviewed in the United States on December 19, 2017

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It's not often that once I start reading a new book that I intentionally "go slow" and re-read paragraphs to make sure that I fully understand what's going on. In a sense, it's a strategy to prolong the pleasure of the read. This is one of those rare books. In addition to being one of the few decent Japanese accounts of WWII, the destroyer (and cruiser) commander's observations are noteworthy. He gives insights into tactical and strategic blunders on both sides of the conflict. Moreover, he participated in most of the major engagements of the War (although his role at Midway was very minor), and fills in details about how the Japanese Navy used and misused its assets from the very start. The grinding effect of growing material and technological advantages by the U.S. is clearly delineated, as is his grudging respect for the talents of American sailors as the War progressed. The only "difficult to digest" comments made by Captain Hara are assertions that Japanese actions such as the infamous rape of Nanking were "exaggerated". He retains the blinders that almost all Japanese have worn since the late 1930s concerning the realities of their actions in the Asian theater of War. Despite this, it's a truly fascinating book.

22 people found this helpful

Jerry Jay Carroll

The Other Side of the War

Reviewed in the United States on July 13, 2019

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This first-person account of a Japanese destroyer captain, among the best of his breed, delivers an insider's look at the Imperial Japanese Fleet in World War II. It went from victory to victory, as did the Japanese Army, to the point it saw itself as victim of their own successes. "Victor's Disease," it was called after the astounding success at Pearl Harbor, Shanghai, Malaysia and various islands in the Pacific Ocean. Then came the battles of Midway and Guadalcanal, the beginning of the beginning of the end for this naval power that overreached itself. Revealing little of himself except as a warrior and a drinker, Captain Tameirichi Hara faithfully records the fall from the glorious heights to when his own ship is sunk on a suicide attack bound for the American fleet investing Okinawa.

5 people found this helpful

The Naval War Fom a Japanese Point of View

Reviewed in the United States on August 27, 2013

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I first read this book back in the late 1960s. As a history major at the time, I had been studying the naval war with Japan for many years and much about it just did not make sense. Why did the Japanese keep on making so many mistakes? There were not stupid, notwithstanding our own propaganda to that effect.

After Captain Hara published his book, historians all over the world were jumping up and down. At last they had an inside view of how the Japanese military had been structured, how inflexible it had become, how it was strategically commanded not by naval staff, but by the needs of the Army. They also came to understand how in the early battles, the U.S. naval forces had fared so badly. Much of it was because of Captain Hara's torpedo doctrine and the navy's vastly superior long range oxygen driven torpedo. But the army was so focused on its own problems, it did not prepare for the obsolescence of its own equipment and/or the needs of the navy which it relied upon for so much.

The Japanese naval high command was also a mess. It did not rely on battle hardened veterans, but rather stuck with its rigid class system and kept on promoting those who never understood the nature of the enemy they faced or the influence technology would have upon its outcome. That Captain Hara was critical of these commanders can only be seen as a very good thing. Many fine Japanese sailors died needlessly because of their errors. Hopefully, today they have eliminated these problems and will not be fighting the last war when the next one is forced upon them.

I have recommended this book many times to young people who have shown an interest in the naval war in the Pacific. It is simply the best book to come out of the war, and notwithstanding the many fine military folks who disagree with me, preferring a more patriotic view, it reveals our enemy of the time in fine detail and tells a story of that conflict no one on our side could match. No study of the naval war could be complete without a thorough understanding of Captain Hara's great adventures. If he made mistakes in his depiction of various battles and/or facts, as some here have claimed, those mistakes have been matched many times over by our own battle observers and writers. That is the nature of war and bias.

Gerald Lane Summers. See my own books.

Mobley's Law, A Mobley Meadows Novel

21 people found this helpful

Pulling back the curtain on the IJN

Reviewed in the United States on December 16, 2020

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Hara tells it like it was. He drives home through personal accounts how once the American ships had radar the Japanese could no longer rule the night by closing in and using torpedoes.

Hara is highly critical of the IJN High Command for not being fighting sailors, he ridicules their repeated use of the same tactics, and careful husbanding of their precious battleships when the destroyers and cruisers were being whittled away in the Solomons.

Hara details the revolt of a group of ship captains when they were ordered to accompany the Yamato on its suicide mission – a waste of 4,000 lives and 6 ships that changed nothing.

A great read.

Top reviews from other countries

FC

Interesting Read Recommended

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 28, 2016

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Very interesting book written by a destroyer captain who actually served through many of the most hard fought actions of the Pacific war. This is both the strength and weakness of the book. Captain Hara can appear very arrogant (according to him his view was correct in all cases), but he does also attempt to give the reasons for other characters decisions and is on the whole fair in his judgements. As a relatively low ranking officer he seems to have access to most of the senior Admirals, which in the highly structured Japanese navy is sometimes difficult to believe, but through this mechcanism several key points are discussed from both sides. Some inaccuracies on statistics on ships, but considering the book was originally written in 1955 facts may not have been available.
I would recommend this book to scholars of the Pacific war as an excellent balancing source to the US view

One person found this helpful

David McIntyre

Indispensable

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 16, 2011

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Some of the best narratives emanating from the second world war are written by Destroyer men,the majority of these RN or USN,this one from the other side of the hill is one of the very best.Captain Hara never lost his initiative,so often the case in the Japanese millitary system of that era,he was also very lucky as he himself says,a fine fluid writer,the description of the loss of his cruiser in the air-sea battle that also saw the loss of the Yamato plus truthful criticism of Admiral Yamamoto and other high command personalities are just two of the many reasons why this book is indispensable to anyone studying the Pacific war and wanting a strong insight into the workings and mindset of the IJN.

One person found this helpful

Edgar R Wagner

Japanese Destroyer Captain

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 29, 2013

Verified Purchase

Captain Hara was not at Pearl Harbor. He was at the Battle of the Java Sea. I thoroughly enjoyed reading the book. I found looking at WWII from a Japanese perspective valuable, if at times somewhat perplexing given that Captain Hara must have realised by the time he wrote the book that things haven't necessarily turned out for Japan as badly as originally feared they would and that Japanese sailors in WWII weren't exactly model colonial administrators.

G Cook

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 24, 2018

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ok

JOANNE YOUNG

Brilliant

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 7, 2018

Verified Purchase

Excellent condition

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