Tales By Japanese Soldiers
By (Author) Kazuo Tamayama
By (author) John Nunneley
Orion Publishing Co
Cassell Military
1st January 2002
11th October 2001
United Kingdom
General
Non Fiction
Second World War
Modern warfare
Biography: philosophy and social sciences
War and defence operations
940.548252
Paperback
256
Width 128mm, Height 196mm, Spine 22mm
240g
Over 305,000 Japanese soldiers fought in Burma between 1942 and 1945; 180,000 of them died. This book, uniquely, tells how the common soldier of the Imperial Japanese Army lived, fought and died in that terrible conflict. Here are straightforward accounts, sometimes moving, often shocking, of what it was like to fight a war in a strange country, far from home, short of food and weapons, confused, facing death from disease and starvation as well as enemy action. Sixty-two 'tales', translated from the Japanese, trace the Burma campaign in chronological sequence and together offer a new perspective on a terrible war. Japanese soldiers, navy men, fighter pilots, and others were from a different culture, but they were not the devils of popular legend. Just like their enemies, they were scared young men, fighting to the death a war they didn't understand.
Dr Kazuo Tamayama is secretary of the Japan-British Society, is actively involved in the reconciliation of the Japanese and British peoples, and was awarded an honorary MBE in 1998. John Nunneley fought the Japanese in Burma, and was wounded in 1944. He is chairman of the Burma Campaign Fellowship Group, which exists to promote British-Japanese friendship. John Nunneley is the Chairman of the Burma Campaign Fellowship Group, a British veterans' association devoted to the promotion of understanding and reconciliation amongst former enemies.